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THE AFTER-SCHOOL SERIES. 



PREPARATORY 



LATIN COURSE 



IN ENGLISH. 



BY ^ 

WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON. 



NEW YORK: 

PHILLIPS & HUNT. 

CINCINNATI : 

WALDEN & STOWE. 

1883. 







Copyright, 1883, 
PHILLIPS & HUNT, 
New Vork. 



PREFACE. 



This is not a school-book — though, on the other hand, it is 
designed to be a book that any boy or girl in school would like 
to read, and would read with profit. It is not a book to 
be studied and labored over — though, again, on the other 
hand, it is designed to be such that some study and labor 
spent on it would prove to have been pains not ill bestowed. 
It is, however, pre-eminently a book to be simply read and 
enjoyed. It is not prepared for any one particular class of 
persons exclusively, but — unless we should except Latin 
specialists — for all classes of persons alike. It is in no sense 
a technical book. It conveys information, but it is informa- 
tion that every intelligent reader will be glad to acquire; 
and it seeks to convey that information in a way to make 
the process itself of acquiring it not only easy, but agreeable. 
What is the nature, and what the extent, of the information 
sought thus to be conveyed, the first chapter of the book will 
sufficiently show. 

The term Preparatory, found in the title of the volume, 
admits a word of explanation. It is there used in a certain 
special or limited sense. In the business of liberal educa- 
tion, this term has, by common consent, been adopted to 
designate and describe that course of preliminary training 
which prepares the student for admission to college. A 
similar limitation of meaning applies to the term as we 



6 Preface. 

employ it in entitling our volume. The introductory relation 
expressed by it is not to general culture in Latin letters, but 
to that more or less definite culture in Latin letters which is 
ordinarily given in an American college or university curricu- 
lum of study. 

What, accordingly, is undertaken in the quaternion of 
books, of which this volume constitutes the second, is dic- 
tated and prescribed by the well-established customs of our 
American institutions of higher education. We do not in 
these books pursue a path of our own independent selecting. 
If such were the case, our steps might possibly here or there 
take a somewhat different direction. As it is, we adhere to a 
course laid down for us beforehand by the experienced en- 
gineer corps of the great regular army of American classical 
education. Or if in speaking thus we speak a little too 
boldly — if it is not in exactly this almost sacred ancient 
way that we should dare talk of here conducting our readers, 
then it is at least in a parallel path drawn as closely as pos- 
sible alongside of that. A shibboleth only separates us 
with our modest irregular troop of lusty light-armed volun- 
teers from the uniformed regulars, who, under the eye of 
accomplished commanders, march in heavier panoply step by 
step at our side. Those speak as they can — God bless them 
and help them ! — their oft-faltering Latin and Greek, while 
our looser light-hearted array moving forward chant their 
song of deliverance, never missing a note, in the easy habit- 
ual accents of their own dear mother-tongue. 

This, then, is a book for readers in general, of whatever 
class. Still, several classes of readers may be named to whom 
the book is especially commended. Whoever is considering 



Preface. 7 

whether he will prepare for college, whoever is now engaged 
in preparing for college, whoever is already a student in col- 
lege, whoever has left a college course unfinished, whoever 
has accomplished a college course and been graduated, would, 
if we have not failed in our attempt, f]nd it agreeable and use- 
ful to read this book. Again, and emphatically, to all the far 
greater number of those whom circumstances have debarred 
from even the hope of gaining classical culture for themselves 
— to such the author would say, It is for you by eminence 
that this book has been written. The key is here offered to 
your hand. Take it and unlock for yourselves the door, no 
longer sealed against your entrance, to treasures no longer 
charmed from your possessorship and enjoyment. If your 
satisfaction in having and holding shall be half as great as his 
satisfaction has been in thus making it possible for you to have 
and to hold, the author, knowing this, would feel his reward 
to be complete. 



CONTENTS. 



I. 

Page. 
What We Propose n 



II. 
The City and the People 16 

III. 
The Literature of Rome 45 

IV. 
A Word or Two of Advice , 55 

V. 
The Latin Reader 63 

VI. 
CyESAR it6 

VII. 
Cicero's Orations 194 

VIII. 
Virgil , 225 

Appendix 310 

1* 



PEEPAEATOET 

LATIN COURSE IN ENGLISH. 



I. 

WHAT WE PROPOSE. 

The present volume is, in order of preparation and pub- 
lication, the second one in a series of four books, devoted, 
all of them, to the same general purpose. That purpose is 
to conduct readers, by means of the English tongue alone, 
through substantially the same course of discipline in Greek 
and Latin literature— not, observe, Greek and Latin, the 
languages, but Greek and Latin literature — as is accomplished 
by students who are graduated from our American colleges. 
The first volume of the series sought in this manner to go 
over the ground in Greek literature usually traversed by the 
student in course of preparing himself to be a college matric- 
ulate. That volume was entitled, "Preparatory Greek 
Course in English." 

This succeeding volume will seek to do the same thing 
for Latin literature. If we ourselves, therefore, do not, in 
preparing this volume, fall short of our mark, whoever reads 
the volume with suitable attention will, having so read it, be as 
well-informed in the literature of the Romans, as are students 
who have triumphantly passed their entrance examinations 
for college, and have thus become duly numbered in the 
ranks of proud and happy freshmen. The present volume 
bears the title, "Preparatory Latin Course in English." 



12 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

The third book will proceed with Greek literature, through 
those successive stages of advance in Greek study at college 
which are appointed to bring, at his graduation, the ingenuous 
and felicitous youth to the goal of the degree of bachelor of 
arts. The third volume is to be styled, " College Greek 
Course in English." 

The fourth and final book will forward the reader to a 
station of progress in knowledge of Latin letters correspond- 
ing with that fixed as the mark for our third book with 
reference to Greek. The fourth book will be named, " Col- 
lege Latin Course in English." 

The watchful reader will have noticed that we make a dis- 
tinction. We say Greek and Latin literature — not Greek and 
Latin, the languages themselves. We do not hope or aim to 
make linguists of our readers. Greek and Latin scholars 
they will not become, however needfully they may read these 
books of ours. Obviously, no such result as actual Greek 
and Latin scholarship, on the part of student or reader, 
could be obtained by a course of training conducted purely 
in English. But to know Greek and Latin letters — letters as 
distinguished from the languages in which the letters are pro- 
duced — this is an entirely possible thing for accomplishment 
through English alone. And this possible thing is what we 
here attempt to enable our readers actually to do. Not, 
then, knowledge of the languages of Greece and Rome, and 
not that peculiar discipline of mind which is to be obtained 
through the pursuit of such knowledge, and in that way 
alone; not these two things — highly desirable indeed, both 
of them, to all, but not to all attainable — are the scope of 
the present series of books; but simply and solely a certain 
degree of familiarity with Greek and Roman literature. 
This, primarily ; and then, secondarily, too, the mental culti- 
vation that inevitably, in the process of gaining the know- 
ledge, comes with the knowledge itself that is gained. 

No reader need now misunderstand us. Our aim is a practical 



What we Propose. 13 



one. It is not, on our own part, foolishly aspiring. It should 
breed no foolish conceit on the part of any reader. No 
truly intelligent reader of our bcoks will ever be found boast- 
ing that he has come to knowledge of Greek and Latin by a 
royal road. To that knowledge there is no royal road. No 
royal road — though a road there is, we verily believe, much 
more nearly worthy of being called royal than the one that 
up to this time has usually been traveled in our schools and 
colleges. Of that, perhaps, in some future issue of this "After- 
school Series" we may speak; but we will not speak of it 
here. We say there is no royal road to Greek and Latin 
scholarship. Whatever flattering opinion you, dear reader, 
that have never studied Greek and Latin, may kindly enter- 
tain of the road we build for you — call it royal, if you please, 
and many thanks for your good-will — still, let there be no 
mistake as to whither the road built by us leads. It does not 
lead to knowledge of Greek and Latin, but only to some 
real knowledge of Greek and Latin letters. You will, indeed, 
be able to talk with college-bred men and women, on a 
tolerable footing of equality, about Greek books and Latin. 
But when it comes to a comparison of your knowledge with 
theirs, in the matter of Greek and Latin, the languages them- 
selves, you will discreetly and modestly be silent. You may 
inwardly suspect — and one chance at least in ten your sus- 
picion will be correct — that your graduate friends, too, might 
better be silent themselves, than loquacious, on these same 
delicate topics of accurate scholarship. Real scholars in 
Greek and Latin are not very plentiful. But that fact let 
college-bred people themselves be the ones to avow. Enough 
for you, not disputing the avowal when made, quietly to en- 
joy the substantial satisfaction of conscious peerage with the 
liberally educated in familiarity with ancient classic litera- 
ture — which familiarity is, after all, the really liberalizing 
thing in classical education. 

It is not meant that the substance only of what is 



14 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

contained in the portions of Roman literature represented, is 
sought to be here conveyed to English readers. Besides the 
substance, we seek to convey also the spirit of the works. 
In any body of literature there may be said to be three ele- 
ments, somewhat separate one from another, a substance, a 
spirit, and a form. Of these three elements, so far as they 
are indeed separable one from another, we shall hope, then, 
to communicate to our readers two — the spirit, as well as the 
substance. The form we have mainly to forego — it being 
precisely our object, out of Latin molds of expression, to take 
up and transfuse into molds of expression that are English, 
the ideas and the genius that we discover contained in the 
works to be reproduced. 

Something, no doubt, of spirit is always inextricably en- 
tangled with form in every literary production. Something, 
therefore, of the Roman spirit we unavoidably lose in 
sacrificing the Roman form. But then, on the other hand, 
in compensation, the spirit is always so much the master of 
form — so much, in fact, the maker of form — in literary expres- 
sion, that when we seize the authentic spirit of a writing, we, 
with this, triumphantly seize, also, more or less trace and effect 
of the very form itself in which that writing was originally 
conceived and cast. To this extent, accordingly, we may 
hope to save even the Roman form of expression. In other 
words, English diction and English construction may, and 
indeed, in good reproduction, they inevitably will, somewhat 
conform and assimilate to the idiom of that Latin literature 
whose spirit they submit themselves to transfuse. 

Somewhat, we say — for after all, practically, the degree per- 
mitted of conformity to Latin idiom must be restrained within 
narrow limits. We expect here to write English, not Latin, 
and not Latinized English, but English of the good old vernac- 
ular sort. Still, our readers may justly presume that they will 
get something of even the form — as we hold them entitled to 
get nearly in full the spirit and the substance — of the Latin 



What we Propose. 15 



literature treated. Once more, let it be remembered that 
what we undertake is not to reproduce Latin authors' works 
entire, or even any single work of any single Latin author 
entire ; but, in absolute strictness of statement, to reproduce 
substantially such Latin works as are read in preparation 
for entering college, and of those works, such parts only as 
are ordinarily gone over by the preparatory student in his 
class-room. If we, here or there, go beyond these rigorous 
limits — and we do not engage but that we may — this must 
not be regarded as creating a new and different obligation 
to be discharged by us to our readers. It will be simply giv- 
ing our readers a little more than we agree. This, of course, 
we shall, on every available occasion, be very glad to do. 

And now may we not, without presumption, aspire to es- 
tablish some agreeable reciprocity of relation between our- 
selves and our readers? We very cordially invite any and 
every reader of this volume who may light upon a mistake in 
it, of the author's or of the printer's, mistake grave or trivial 
— and no matter how trivial — to point out to us the discovery 
as soon as it is made. It is our earnest desire to have our 
work as free as possible from errors of whatever sort. We 
shall thankfully welcome also the suggestion of any change, 
either in plan or in execution, that might promise to render 
what we here do more widely acceptable or more effectively 
useful. We are already in debt to a number of friendly 
volunteer correspondents, unknown to us by face, who were 
at the pains to apprise us of slips made by the author or the 
printer in the companion volume that preceded this, namely, 
the " Preparatory Greek Course in English." We shall be 
gratefully glad if we may feel ourselves to be, in the endeavor 
to make our books faultless, of one guild and fellowship with 
all our readers. 

Our plan of procedure in the present volume will be 
this : after a rapid sketch of Roman history blended with 
a sketch of the city of Rome itself, the seat of Roman 



1 6 Preparatory Lathi Course in English. 

power and the origin of Latin letters, summarily to pre- 
sent the body of writing that the Roman people produced ; 
and then, a brief parenthetical chapter intervening, of friend- 
ly counsel to the student, to take up, successively, the Latin 
Reader, (which we shall make include some specimens of 
Sallust and of Ovid,) the Commentaries of Caesar, a few ora- 
tions of Cicero, and the poetry, especially the ^Eneid, of 
Virgil. 

It is a loaded table of contents to spread in a single 
volume before our readers. But we will trust their appetite, 
as we shall have to ask them to trust our cookery. The 
quality, not less than the quantity, of the provision, is amply 
good. It will, we confess it beforehand, be the fault of the 
cook if the feast is disappointing. 



II. 
THE CITY AND THE PEOPLE. 

We are about to deal with certain limited portions of the 
literature called Latin. The literature called Latin was pro- 
duced by a people called Roman, chiefly in a city called Rome. 
Before entering upon the presentation of the proposed select 
portions of Latin literature, we pause, but a swift moment or 
two, to say something of the people that produced the litera- 
ture, and of the city in which the literature was produced. 

When, in the preceding volume, we began the correspond- 
ing work with Greek literature, we were able to consider the 
land and the people separately, in separate chapters. In the 
present case, we shall be compelled to blend the place and 
the race in one joint and common treatment. The reason 
for the difference is, that Greece, however small in area, was 
yet a country, and, as such, had its peculiar character, inde- 
pendently of its inhabitants ; whereas Rome, however large 



The City and the People. 1 7 

in area, was a city, not a country, and, as a city, took its 
character and its history from the character and the history 
of the people that built it and that held it It is true that 
Rome, at a comparatively early point in her long historic 
career, extending the right of citizenship to Italy in general, 
thus converted the whole peninsula into one great suburb to 
the metropolis. Still, Rome herself always remained so cen- 
tral and so controlling in the national system, that we shall 
best represent the reality to our readers by concentrating 
their attention almost exclusively upon the city alone. 

Over every thing pertaining to Rome, except her language 
and her literature, the name Roman lords it exclusively. We 
say, Roman power, Roman conquest, Roman law, Roman 
architecture, Roman art, Roman history. It is curious that 
the language always, and the literature generally, of Rome 
should be called, not Roman, but Latin. The circumstance 
may be taken to indicate, what is indeed the fact in reference 
to Rome, that literature was for her a subordinate interest. 
Unlike Greece, Rome is less remarkable for what she wrote, 
than for what she wrought. Less remarkable, we say; but 
this could easily be and Roman writings remain, as in fact 
they do remain, in a very high degree remarkable. For the 
deeds of Rome surpass, in enduring influence on the fort- 
unes of mankind, the deeds of any other nation in the world. 
If Rome wrote with her left hand while she wrought with 
her right, her left hand was yet an instrument of marvelous 
cunning and power. One can fancy how Rome, content if 
she branded the epithet Roman on what she did, might from 
what she said or wrote unconsciously disdain to remove the 
traditional name Latin. 

For the word Latin was applied by the ancient Roman writ- 
ers themselves to their language and their literature. Before 
there was a city Rome, there was a country Latium in which 
Rome would be built. The country Latium contributed the 
adjective Latin to describe the language and the literature of 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



the city Rome. The designation continues to this day, and 
it will no doubt continue indefinitely in the future. When we 
say Greek, we violate the custom of the Greeks, who never 
described themselves or any thing pertaining to them by that 
word. When we say Latin, we observe the custom of the Ro- 
mans, who habitually so described their own language and liter- 
ature. In both cases we acknowledge the authority of Rome. 
For Greek, as well as Latin, is a name dictated to us by Roman 
example — a curious symbol of the ascendant power of Rome. 

Rome has a long history. But the history of Rome is not 
so long as is the date of the existence of the city. The city, 
that is to say, was founded an unreckoned time before the 
history of the city began. But where history fails, there is 
plenty of fable. The fable followed by Virgil recounts how 
^Eneas, escaping, with a trusty few, from the flames of Troy, 
bore the beginnings of Rome across from Asia to Italy. If 
this fable were fact, and if, moreover, anybody knew the date 
of the fact, then, of course, an origin in time for the history of 
Rome could be fixed. As it is, for all the information to be 
drawn from the sources that supplied to Virgil the story of 
^Eneas, we are in blank darkness. According to a second 
legend, lapping on and piecing out the first, Mars, the Roman 
god of war, was father to a boy named Romulus, who, after a 
miraculous infancy answering to this his miraculous birth, 
grew up to found a city on which he impressed his name. 
A line of legendary kings succeeded, closed by Tarquin the 
Proud, whose arrogance and cruelty provoked a revolution, 
as the result of which a republic was established to supersede 
the monarchy. 

This republic of Rome, authentic Roman history when it 
began confronted as a palpable fact already existing. This 
was about three centuries before the Christian era. The state 
of things was, at that period, such as unmistakably to show 
that a considerable space of national life had preceded. That 
national life, however, had made no trustworthy record of itself 



The City and the People. 19 

then anywhere surviving; no record, that is to say, existing 
in regular written form fit to be called history. There were 
public works, there were institutions of government, there 
were established usages, and there was a body of popular 
traditions. The study of these various monuments of pre- 
historic Roman antiquity, as found actually still existing, or 
as reported of to our generation by ancient writers of Rome 
in extant Latin literature, has led late sagacious historical 
critics to certain conjectural conclusions with reference to 
the period of Roman national life anterior to written record, 
which every reader is entitled to receive with credit graduated 
according to his own individual estimate of their probable 
correctness, 

There seems to be no doubt that Rome was in early times 
a monarchy. It is quite certain that, later, a republic of 
Rome existed for an indefinite period of time previous to the 
war with Pyrrhus — which war may, however, be assumed as 
the starting-point of Roman history worthy to be so called. 

This war with Pyrrhus broke out, to be now a little exact, 
in the year 281 before Christ. Rome had been gradually ab- 
sorbing Italy into her empire ; but there were in Italy certain 
Greek cities not disposed to be absorbed. One of these, a 
Lacedaemonian colony, Tarentum, invited the bold and able 
king of E-pi'rus, a country to the north-west of Greece proper, 
to come over and lend help against the Romans. This king 
was Pyrrhus, and Pyrrhus, paired with the famous diplomat- 
ist Cineas, somewhat as, in our own time, with Count Cavour 
was paired Victor Immanuel, proved a formidable antag- 
onist to the pretensions of Rome. Rome conquered, how- 
ever, and within less than twenty years was undisputed mis- 
tress of Italy. 

But now immediately began the protracted and deadly 
duel, doubtful so long, on both sides waged not merely for 
supremacy but for life, between Rome and the African city 
of Carthage. Every body knows the name of Carthaginian 



20 Prepai'atory Latin Course in English. 

Ham-il'car, of Has'dru-bal, of Han'ni-bal outshining either and 
itself hardly outshone by any name whatever to be found in 
rival Roman story ; of Roman Reg'u-lus, with that high, brac- 
ing, but pathetic legend concerning him, of patriot devotion 
and good faith with foes kept at cost of cruel death ; of Fa'bi-us, 
the master of delay, contrasted with Scipio (Sip'i-o), admir- 
ingly pronounced by Milton " the heighth of Rome," him who 
carried the war into Africa, making that phrase thenceforward 
forever a proverb of aggressive prowess — these names, we 
say, every body knows; and these personal names, with the 
local names of Cannes and Capua, scenes of memorable battle 
and siege, recall, better than mere detail of incident would 
do, the struggle of sixty years and more that ended in the 
humiliation of Carthage and the decisive triumph of Rome. 

The subjugation of Carthage was the beginning to Rome of 
a career, prolonged, perhaps, beyond any other example in 
history, of foreign conquest and glory. With few checks to 
her progress, Rome from this time forward — that is, from 
about two hundred years before Christ — rapidly expanded 
her dominions in every direction, until they embraced almost 
literally the whole then known world. Macedonia was first, 
after Carthage had yielded, to feel the hand of Roman power. 
Syria soon shared the fate of Macedonia. The imperial city 
—imperial in the reach of her sway, though still, and for near 
two hundred years to remain, republican in the form of her 
polity— threw out meanwhile her invincible legions westward 
into Spain, and northward to the feet of the Alps. The Alps 
themselves proved no barrier to the rising impetuous tide of 
Roman ambition. Her advance surged over the summits of 
perpetual snow, and rolled, in a torrent that nothing could 
stay, into the fields and forests of Gaul. Macedonia, hissing 
at the heel of her conqueror, was stamped into silence. 
Carthage, tempting her foe to extremity, was blotted utterly 
out of the world, by sword and torch in the hand of a second 
Scipio Af-ri-ca'nus. 



The City and the People. 



The name of Gracchus (Grak'kus) calls up the image of 
outwardly victorious Rome inwardly rent with faction. It 
was the feud of the many against the few, one party as self- 
ish, perhaps, in the end as the other, and both equally con- 
tending for the prize of power in the state. The few at first 
prevailed, and there followed a period of corruption in public 
morals scarcely paralleled in Roman history. Ju-gur'tha, 
usurping king of Numidia, is for some time able, of the Ro- 
man generals sent against him, to buy such as he cannot beat, 
until at length the redoubtable figure of Ma'rius looms on the 
gloomy and inglorious scene. 

The election of Marius to the consulship was a triumph 
achieved, in their turn, by the many over the few. It was an 
ominous triumph. The rapid and splendid successes won by 
the arms of Marius, first over Jugurtha, and then over the 
Cimbrians and Teutons, made that great but unprincipled 
man omnipotent in Rome. But the date of his omnipotence 
was short. 

The few soon came to their turn again. They, on their 
side, found in Syl'la a champion not unmeet to cope with the 
popular champion Marius. A bloody civil war ensued, in 
which the aristocrats under Sylla were the victors. The 
historic picture of Marius, ruined, sitting amid the ruins of 
Carthage, indicates the tragic final issue of life to a man 
whose name and whose spirit, both bequeathed to a political 
party, survived himself in a long entail of fateful influence 
on the fortune of the Roman state. 

The foreign conquests of Rome were hardly suspended 
during these dreadful internal conflicts. The brilliant names 
of Lu-cul'lus and Pom'pey now light up the sky of Roman re- 
nown, while, just below the conscious horizon, we feel the 
growing nearness of the all-eclipsing sun of Roman history. 
" Great Julius " is about to begin his lordly upward journey 
toward a zenith of power and of glory, from which he will fall 
so tragically, so suddenly, and so soon. Also, "the time 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



draws near the birth of Christ." Within comparatively a few 
years now will be crowded together most of the great Roman 
writers who have made for us that Latin literature to intro- 
duce which to our readers we are here giving them this rapid 
sketch of the history of Rome. 

The story of Caesar's career, mingled of glory and of 
shame, and the story of the differently glorious and inglori- 
ous career of his nephew, the emperor Au-gus'tus — these are 
so well known that they seem almost to be a part of modern 
history. Of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, pro- 
tracted through many centuries, like the slow leaning and re- 
luctant approach to the ground of an oak that has sunk its 
roots deep, and anchored them to the rocks of the centre — of 
this we shall not here speak at all. Strictly classic Latin litera- 
ture was already a finished library before the decay of Roman 
power visibly began. The age of Augustus was — how can we 
better, how can we even otherwise adequately, express it? 
— the Augustan age of Latin literature. There were noble 
Roman writers after this time, but hardly any with whom our 
duty here will summon us to deal. Let us, then, say, that our 
sketch of the history of Roman conquest is done. 

The great race who accomplished such a history as that 
which we thus have summarized built for themselves a city 
worthy of the renown of which it was to become the centre 
and seat. Ancient Rome is, on the whole, and on the whole 
it deservedly is, the most famous city in the world. Its site 
was on the river Tiber, about fifteen miles from the sea. 

When we here say " sea," we mean the Mediterranean Sea. 
Consider that nearly all the international commerce carried 
on through navigation by the ancients was confined to the 
waters of this vast midland ocean, and observe further that, of 
three great peninsulas stretching down into the Mediterranean 
from the continent of Europe on the north well toward 
the continent of Africa on the south, the boot-shaped penin- 
sula of Italy is the central one, while likewise as to Italy 



The City and the People. 23 

itself Rome is centrally placed — consider, we say, these 
points, and you will perceive that the site of Rome, un- 
attractive and ineligible in itself, was, on the map of the 
then known world, as convenient as any that could have been 
selected for a city destined to become a metropolis and mis- 
tress of the nations. Its remove from the coast secured it, 
in its feeble beginning, against pirates, while the navigable 
siream of the Tiber made it virtually a sea-board town. 

Rome grew from age to age, until finally seven different 
hills, bearing stately Latin names, were embraced within its 
compass. Hence its sounding designation, the City of the 
Seven Hills. It was, if we may trust tradition, (this was long 
before its empire had extended beyond the bounds of Italy,) 
sacked and burned by the invading Gauls. What precious 
monuments perished in that catastrophe, can only be con- 
jectured. But probably the primeval Rome which the Gauls 
destroyed, however grand in comparison of its contemporary 
rivals, was a city that, to our modern eyes, could we see it 
now as it then existed, would seem but very moderately 
magnificent. Even the splendid capital that Augustus, ac- 
cording to the familiar hyperbole, built in marble, by trans- 
formation from the brick in which he found it, lacked some 
important features that we now demand as necessary to sat- 
isfy our ideas of imposing effect in a city. Augustan Rome 
was built, in considerable part, without proper streets of any 
sort, the houses of the nobles being disposed, as it were hap- 
hazard, here and there, amid parks and gardens, over that 
portion of the city's site which they occupied. The streets 
that did exist, worthy of that name, were continuations of the 
great roads radiating from Rome in every direction out into 
the provinces ; and these highways, sternly straight without 
the walls, were likely within to be winding as well as narrow. 

But whatever other element of imposing effect ancient 
Rome lacked, it did not lack magnitude. It covered a 
great extent of ground, and covered much of that extent with 




Temple of Concord. 



The City and the People. 



25 



spaces, here and there, in the city, for light and air — the 
forums being meeting-places for business, and the campuses 
being pleasure-grounds, like modern parks. Of these feat- 
ures of imperial Rome, many remain, some remarkably pre- 
served, others not less august in ruin, to this day. 

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime — 

the Pan-the'-on, fitly and memorably so described in the fine 
adjective verse of Byron, stands a striking monumental 




PANTHEON. 



symbol at once of the Rome that was and of the Rome that 
has succeeded. The Pantheon, guessed to have been orig- 
inally a temple dedicated in common to all or to many of the 
gods of polytheism, (whence its name,) is now a Roman 
Catholic church. The Colise'um, more properly Colosse'um, 
(so named from its neighborhood to a colossal statue of 
Nero,) a roofless amphitheatre for gladiatorial exhibitions, 
2 



26 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



built of stone and capable of seating more than eighty thou- 
sand spectators, is, after having served for centuries to de- 
generate Roman nobles as a quarry of building material for 
their palaces, now one of the chief spectacles in modern 
Rome to excite the wonder and awe of the tourist. Broken 
columns, columns half buried in the dust of ages, arches 




COLOSSEUM. 



with the bloom of the artist's finish long gone from them, 
but in their bold outlines unsubdued by time, or chance, or 
change, ruined baths, palaces become wildernesses, aque- 
ducts striding out in stone over the Campagna, (Cam-pan'ya,) 
relieved against the sky, with that majestic, all-defying gait 
of theirs — these mementoes abide, mutilated, indeed, and 
melancholy, but indestructible like nature itself, to attest the 



The City and the People. ty 

greatness of that perished race whose left-hand by-play we are 
here to study in a few portions of their surviving literature. 

Not, however, at Rome itself, but remote from Rome, are 
to be found perhaps the most eloquent of all existing memo- 
rials of Roman greatness. Go almost anywhere that it may 
chance, in the Europe of to-day, and light upon pieces of 
Roman road, imbedded in the soil as if they were stratified 
there when the primeval rocks were cast and when the mount- 
ains were brought forth ; light upon walls of fortification 
that were laid, it may be, in far-off Britain soon after " great 
Julius" fell; find cities there that took their rise from the 
chance of a Roman army's having had their encampment 
on the spot, and that still, in their English names, of Ches- 
ter or Dorchester, (from Latin, castra, camp,) carry a remin- 
iscence of their origin — actually see these things with your 
eyes, feel them with your feet, and then the mighty enchant- 
ment of Roman dominion will begin to assert itself, with 
something like its due influence, over your sentiment and 
your imagination. 

Less impressive to the merely picturesque fancy, but quite 
equally so to the thoughtfully constructive historic sense, is 
the sign-manual of the Roman character everywhere im- 
printed upon the laws and civil institutions of Europe. The 
Germans, pressing powerfully forward in the van of current 
national development, when they proudly, at Versailles, new- 
named King William, Kaiser, so hailed him emperor, by a 
title dictated to them, in unconscious anticipation, twenty 
centuries before he was born, by the stretched-out arm of 
posthumous influence proceeding from the Julian house of 
Rome, in the person of their great representative, Caius 
Julius Caesar. 

We stop here in our survey of what ancient Rome did and 
was; but we stop without finishing, as also we set out without 
beginning. The subject of Roman history is, indeed, at both 
ends, endless. We should like to tell our readers something 



28 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

about the Romans, ethnologically ; that is, of what blood they 
were sprung. But this nobody really knows. To most his- 
torical students it has seemed probable that they were, like 
perhaps every other one of the great races of mankind, 
with the remarkable sole exception of the Jews, a highly 
mixed and composite race. This mingled character has, 
however, been denied to the Romans by one of the most 
considerable recent authorities in Roman history, the Ger- 
man historian Mommsen. Thus much, at least, is now, we 
believe, universally agreed, that the Roman race, or, speaking 
more largely, the Italian, was a twin offshoot with the Gre- 
cian, of a common Ar'yan or Indo-European stock. This 
means that both Greeks and Romans were descended from 
a people that, having its original home in Central Asia, 
spread thence Outward in two main directions, one toward 
India and one westward over Europe. Beyond this very 
general fact in Roman ethnology, settled chiefly by compari- 
son of languages — Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit — there is noth- 
ing in the question of the derivation of the race that prob- 
ably would interest our readers. 

The study of ethnology, indeed, as applied to the particu- 
lar case of any given people, can never, from the nature of 
things, yield wholly satisfactory results. Races do not keep 
their outlines persistently firm and distinct. They flow into 
each other, in the revolving kaleidoscope of history shaken 
by the hand of Time, and form endlessly new and various 
combinations. Only such great divisions of blood as, to il- 
lustrate, those for which there have come to be adopted the 
designations Aryan and Sem-it'ic, remain separate and distin- 
guishable. From one to another of even these, there is more 
or less of mutual exchange and interpenetration. But with- 
in these limits respectively, the reciprocal flux and reflux of 
blood and blood — long reaches of time being taken into the 
account — may be pronounced free and incessant. Migra- 
tions and conquests have often, with violence, suddenly 



The City and the People. 29 

shuffled different peoples in masses into each other. The 
peaceful attritions of commerce have had a similar effect, in 
a slower and less strikingly observable way. Altogether, the 
ethnological classification of the prehistoric Romans is, be- 
yond the general fact concerning them already indicated, 
namely, that they were Aryan, a matter of special, rather 
than general, interest. The whole subject may here with 
propriety be indefinitely postponed. 

More interesting, and more likely to be fruitful, is the 
question how the Romans ran the great career that they did. 
We have told that they conquered and governed the world; 
of their method in doing these things, we have thus far said 
not a word. Their secret might all be summed up in a single 
sentence — a sentence which to the superficial mind would 
naturally seem a mere truism : they conquered and they 
governed, by being conquerors and governors. What they 
did, that is to say, is explained by what they were. Com- 
prehensively, intimately, consistently, intensely, incessantly, 
exclusively, they were conquerors and governors. 

In the two functions thus indicated, the ancient Romans 
absorbed themselves almost completely. There was very 
little left of them at any time to render account of itself 
otherwise than so. Romans all lived for the state. The 
state was at once the unit and the sum of Roman society. 
The family, the individual, was nothing, and the state was 
all. This was the theory, and this was the practice, of Ro- 
man life. The national idea was never forgotten. True, 
indeed, the individual was exalted by being a member of 
an exalted civil society. But such seemed not to be the 
Roman form of selfish consideration. The ideal Roman was 
a very definite conception. He was legendary Cur'ti-us, 
willing for the state to take his forlorn leap into darkness. 

We are not representing that the Roman commonwealth 
was an unselfish state. Nothing could be farther from the 
truth than this. We are not representing that the individual 



30 Preparatory Latin Course i?i English. 

Roman was, in all his relations, an unselfish man. This, also, 
would be wide of the truth. But the relation of the individual 
Roman citizen to the state — this at least bore always an as- 
pect of generosity. If there was selfishness still at bottom, it 
was an exceedingly specious, a noble, a magnanimous selfish- 
ness. The appearance was of the opposite to selfishness. 
You saw nothing but self-abnegation, self-sacrifice, devotion. 

This meant that to the individual citizen every thing was 
to be dared, and every thing endured, to make the state con- 
stantly greater than it was — greater, that is, not in moral qual- 
ities, but in wealth and in power. (We speak now somewhat 
largely, disregarding exceptions, and avoiding qualifications. 
We speak, too, of Rome as Rome was before the imperial 
system began. We exaggerate and idealize a little, for the 
sake of greater distinctness.) To wealth and power for the 
state there was open one straight road. That road was con- 
quest. Conquest, therefore, was the one business of the 
state — conquest, in a twofold sense : first, subjugation by 
arms ; second, consequent upon subjugation, rule by law. 

In the road to wealth and power through conquest, in this 
double meaning of the word conquest, there lay for Rome no 
obstacles but purely material obstacles. Obstacles of the 
moral or sentimental sort did not exist for Rome. There 
perhaps never was another nation so absolutely devoid as 
were the Romans of any thing like sentiment. Pure cold 
blood, always exactly at zero, was Rome's invariable temper. 
Her constancy to her purpose of dominion is one of the mir- 
acles of history. But, in truth, there was nothing to weaken, 
or in any wise perturb, that constancy. She experienced 
no state of mutiny in the councils of her heart. Greece 
loved art, she loved eloquence, she loved letters, as things 
desirable and amiable in themselves. Greece was, too, 
capable of sheer generosity. She had her enthusiasms. 
Rome was not Greece. Rome never felt the warmth of a 
generous emotion so much as once thrill along the gelid 



The City a?id the People. 31 

courses of her blood. Rome would turn upon the eager and 
expectant face of a suffering cause, pleading to her for assist- 
ance, if not the gloating eyes of greed frankly glad for her 
chance, then simply the fixed and fixing stony stare of Me- 
du'sa. If Rome did any thing in the way of art, it was most 
likely by bringing home, in barbaric triumph, the spoil of 
pictures, of vases, of statues, plundered from conquered cities. 
The enlightened spirit in which Rome practiced this aesthetic 
robber-industry of hers is amusingly, if a little extravagantly, 
illustrated by the story of the Roman general, who, in ship- 
ping across sea to Italy a plundered masterpiece of Grecian 
art, duly advised the forwarder that, in case of injury done to 
the article, he, the forwarder, would be held strictly respon- 
sible for furnishing a duplicate of equal value. Conceive 
an honest ship-master duplicating, for instance, a statue by 
Phidias ! 

Rome cultivated eloquence indeed ; but, at least before 
her period of aggression was virtually over, it was solely as a 
practical expedient in affairs, not as an embellishment of civ- 
ilized life. Letters she almost wholly neglected until her 
conquest of the world was accomplished. Sentimental inter- 
ests like these never disputed place in her heart with the 
purpose of self-aggrandizement by conquest. 

It would be impossible to exaggerate the supreme and ex- 
clusive dominion exercised by the national purpose to con- 
quer, over Roman character and life. This purpose was a 
fire that burned up in the soul of Rome every thing that 
tended to hinder it, every thing that did not volunteer to 
help it. Truth, honor, justice, pity, love — every sentiment 
that had in it a trace of unselfishness— was withered, was 
shriveled, was turned to ashes, licked by that fierce, fiery, 
flickering tongue. It is comparatively easy to conquer, if 
you are a conqueror — that simply, solely, exclusively. Meth- 
ods of conquest are secondary and subordinate to the purpose 
of conquering. lv The will is the way. 



32 P?-eparatory Latin Course in English. 

The Romans had the will. Their will made them take the 
sword into their own hands. They did not fight by proxy. 
They fought in person. They lived chiefly by fighting. The 
country immediately around the city was poor, and they came 
by degrees to depend chiefly on rapine for subsistence. They 
had every thing to gain, and little to lose, by the chance of a 
battle. This was at first. With rare exceptions, the same 
thing remained true throughout their history. They almost 
always waged war themselves; they seldom suffered war 
waged upon them by others. It was of no use to defeat the 
Romans in battle. Defeat experienced by them only made 
them more resolute than before. They, in fact, never made 
peace but as conquerors. On every occasion, on almost 
every occasion, of disaster to their arms, they rose in spirit 
with the decline of their fortune, and demanded more, rather 
than less, as condition of peace. There was but one effectual 
way to subdue such a people, and that way was to annihilate 
them. The nation to annihilate the Romans did not appear. 
Be patient : they will at last, with long suicide, annihilate 
themselves. 

The Roman military discipline was the quite natural, the 
inevitable, development of the Roman genius. Its rigor, its 
comprehension, its minute attention to details, were like the 
action of the law of gravitation. You could count on it as 
you count on the persistent uniformity of nature. It forgot 
nothing, made no exceptions, exercised no pity, felt no mis- 
giving. A Roman father, in command of an army, did not 
wink putting his own son to death for gaining a victory over 
the enemy without waiting for orders. What wonder ? That 
father had, perhaps — who knows?— just before starting forth 
on his campaign, abandoned an infant sister of that son to take 
her chance of life or death — according to the practice of in- 
fant exposition, so called, in use at Rome, for convenient 
riddance of children not desired, among a people well 
described, in the gross, as "without natural affection." If 



The City and the People. §Z 

a legion, panic-smitten, turned its back in battle, every tenth 
man of its number was first put to the sword, and then the 
decimated legion, bleeding and staggering with its six hun- 
dred gaping wounds, was marched back to the front to take 
the brunt of the next mortal encounter with the foe. 

The soldiers were worked so hard in camp and march, 
that they begged to fight as a welcome reprieve from toils 
more intolerable than danger or than death. Every night, 
on every march, however long the march might be, and 
wherever they might halt, they made a fortified town of their 
encampment, by digging a trench twelve feet broad and nine 
feet deep around the whole circuit, and building the dirt 
thrown out into an embankment, which they then strength- 
ened with a paling of driven stakes, bristling impenetrably to- 
ward the foe. These stakes, to the number, sometimes, of 
twelve to each man, they carried with them on the march. 
Besides these stakes, they carried on their persons, every 
soldier, a spade, a pickaxe, a hatchet, a saw, and various 
other implements, until, with rations for fifteen days, their 
armor not reckoned, the total weight was sixty pounds. 
Their armor, offensive and defensive — made always heavier 
than that of any enemy they might have to meet — they did 
not call part of their burden, but part of themselves, like 
their clothes. Thus handicapped, they marched in five 
hours ordinarily twenty Roman miles ; at a pinch, twenty-four. 

We hear little or nothing of sickness in Roman armies. 
Whether this signifies that there was no sickness, or that 
sickness was a trifle not worth mentioning, we need not de- 
cide. Manifestly, there was not much soft fibre left in Ro- 
man military muscle to be attacked and dissolved by dis- 
ease. Softness of heart was as rare as softness of muscle. 
The very diversions of the people were a school to hardness 
of heart. The appetite for blood was exasperated by the 
brutal shows of the amphitheatre. In one word, the Roman 
man was made into a pure automaton of soldiership and 
2* 



34 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

rulership. There came at length to be no organs in him that 
had not been transformed and perverted into these. 

Still, perfect soldiership and leadership involve much be- 
sides what is merely physical. The Romans did not do their 
work exclusively by main strength and with heavy blows. 
They had a method for their conquests. They proceeded 
according to a plan. Viewed now in the backward perspec- 
tive of a finished history, their policy in conquering and in 
governing may be made to seem the consummation of fore- 
cast and wisdom. The organization of their armies was ad- 
mirable. But it was always in process of becoming more 
and more admirable. ' Whatever superior feature they found 
in the military scheme of other nations, they did not hesitate 
to transfer and adopt into their own: Their enemies did 
not have two chances to meet them with any species of ar- 
mament more formidable than they themselves possessed. 
They let their foes teach them to beat their foes. The 
Spaniards and the Gauls enjoyed, each nation in its turn, the 
honor of furnishing to the Romans the model for their sword. 
From Pyrrhus, Rome learned how to order her encampment; 
from Carthage, how to build ships. She imported horses 
from Numidia. She trained a force of Cretan bowmen, of 
Bal-e-a'ric slingers. Every particular superiority of every 
nation, Rome took to herself and made her own. 

With this comprehensive assemblage in herself of all par- 
ticular national superiorities, Rome made her military as- 
cendency overwhelming. But she added a hardened bodily 
strength and endurance, an exercised agility and skill, in her 
individual soldiers, a perfect organization, a mobile disposi- 
tion, of the mass, that were nowhere else equaled. Then her 
military roads, solid and straight, enabled her to move her 
armies with a swiftness that continually surprised and over- 
awed her enemies. The terror of her name prepared her 
most distant enemies beforehand for defeat. Her sudden, 
as it were supernatural, appearance to their face dismayed 



The City and the People. 35 

them, like an omen from the gods. They were already half 
conquered before the battle. Other races, as the Gauls and 
the Germans, were equally brave with the Romans. These 
fierce semi-barbarian warriors would deliver an onset with 
an enthusiasm, a frenzy, of courage. It was like the dash of 
a torrent. But the Romans took the torrent's dash like a 
rock. Courage, onset, seemed to be useless against such 
resistance. If the legion for a moment was broken, it could 
form again, not less adamantine than before, in the face of 
the foe, amid the full fury of battle. Read the cold-blooded 
Commentaries of Caesar, and you are affected as with a sense 
of seeing uncounted thousands of human beings warring 
hopelessly, desperately, with fate. Caesar drove his legion 
like a car of Juggernaut over those Gallic and German 
tribes eagerly flinging themselves forward to bloody death 
beneath his reeking wheels. It is indescribably depressing. 
The Commentaries of Caesar, awaiting the attention of our 
readers in pages to follow, will supply ample illustration in 
particular instances for many of the features in Rome's 
method of conquering, here described briefly in terms of bold 
general statement. The same is true also of Sallust's his- 
tory of the Jugurthine war, still earlier to find place in these 
pages. 

Do you wonder what occasion Rome could find for mak- 
ing war on every nation under heaven ? She was as resource- 
ful in picking quarrels as she was afterward obstinate in fight- 
ing her quarrels to the end. As soon as she had conquered a 
people she made that people her ally. Then nobody must 
meddle with her ally. If there was a war going on anywhere 
in the world, Rome's habit was to be promptly at hand for a 
share in the fray. She chose her side with the weaker of the 
combatants. Her heavy hand in the scale of course decided 
the dip of the balance. The war finished, she had con- 
quered two nations at one stroke — the weaker by grappling 
it to herself in alliance, the stronger by the help of the 



36 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



weaker. For like reason, Rome never turned a deaf ear to 
appeals for interference from a nation at war. She consti- 
tuted the appealing nation at once her ally, and, after net 
wont, used it to make prize for herself of its enemy. If 
there was not a promising quarrel anywhere at a given mo- 
ment in progress, that circumstance created no difficulty for 
Rome. It was easy enough any fine morning to despatch an 
ambassador to some distant people, commissioned to use 
with them language so high that they would certainly resent 
it. Then an insult to her ambassador, it necessarily behooved 
the majesty of Rome signally to avenge. It was the fable, 
enacted in history, of the lamb accused of roiling the cur- 
rent up-stream for the wolf. 

It would be long to tell half the expedients adopted by 
the senate of Rome to push their business of conquest. 
Rome had much to say of honor, and good faith, and the 
inviolability of oaths. She abhorred the duplicity of Car- 
thage. " Punic faith " — she has made the phrase a proverb 
to all time of false dealing between nations. This style of 
speech on Rome's part — this ostensible disdain of false deal- 
ing — you must be careful, however, not to misunderstand. 
It by no means imported that Rome herself might not be as 
clever as she chose to be, in avoiding the obligation of con- 
ventions and treaties. If, having unhappily covenanted with 
Carthage not to destroy that city, she found afterward that to 
have that city destroyed was necessary to her profit or to 
her revenge, Rome had her way of managing the matter. 
She became philological, and made a verbal distinction. She 
had not promised to spare the town, but only the city. The 
city was the municipality with the inhabitants. The town 
was the aggregation of buildings. She destroyed the town, 
but spared the city. And who could say but the faith of 
treaties was duly observed by Rome ? Who could stop 
Rome from continuing to cry shame, with immaculate lips, on 
the perfidy of Carthage ? Did a Roman general in extremity 



The City and the People. 37 

come to terms with a foe ? The senate could accept the ad- 
vantage but repudiate the price. Did even a consul sign a 
treaty that Rome subsequent!;. tied not to like? She 

could tear the treaty in tatters, and save her 
faith by sending the consul who signed it a prisoner to the 
enemy! Rome gave Jugurtha peace on condition of his sur- 
rendering his elephants, his horses, his gold, the deserters 
that had come to him. When these had been duly surren- 
dered the weakened prince was next, forsooth, summoned to 
surrender himself! Jugurtha's St. Helena was a Roman 
dungeon. In his subterranean Longwood, Jugurtha would 
probably not have chafed, as did Napoleon, at mere want of 
due deference shown him. Jugurtha might thankfully have 
eaten the crumbs that fell from captive Napoleon's table. 
Rome starved Jugurtha to death. 

This capacity, on the part of Rome, to use the diplomatist's 
wit as well as the warrior's sword, was associated with much 
thrifty self-restraint and patience exercised by her, when oc- 
casion demanded, in obtaining her end, whether the end 
was to fat her greed or to feast her revenge. She was 
proud, but hers was that " considerate pride," attributed by 
Milton to Satan, which attended its chance. If she had too 
many affairs on hand to be able to punish to-day, there was 
always a to-morrow for Rome. Was she not the eternal 
city ? Her cold blood served her well. She waited for the 
fruit she desired to ripen on the tree. It was easier to let the 
fruit fall than to pluck it, and generally the flavor was better. 
Thus, she did not at once and abruptly reduce every enemy 
overcome to absolute subjection. Often she contented her- 
self, for the present, with simply making an enemy conven- 
iently weak. She then suffered the tributary state to grow 
gradually accustomed to obey. 

Of course, Rome did her conquering always at the ex- 
pense of the conquered. Her governing, too, she did at the 
expense of the governed. But we need hardly make this 



38 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

distinction. Rome's governing was of the same species with 
her conquering. It was conquest continued. To be a Roman 
province was only less a calamity than to be a nation at war 
with Rome. The pillage of peace was not quite so destruc- 
tive as the pillage of war. That was all the difference. To 
be governed, as to be conquered, by Rome, was, to the un- 
happy victim, pillage the same. Indeed, to say that Rome 
made the nations pay the expense of being conquered by 
her, and being governed by her, is a ridiculously inadequate 
statement of the fact. The nations did that for Rome, and 
much more. They, besides, made Rome, both the state at 
large and individual citizens, incredibly rich. Practically, it 
was the sole question with the Romans how much spoil a 
province might, with good farming, be made to yield. The 
subject nations came to pour not less than half the products 
of all their toil into the spendthrift and luxurious lap of their 
mistress, Rome. Rome was to the world like a monstrous 
ulcer that constantly drained the juices of its life, and that 
constantly grew by what it fed on to want more and more. 

Rome, it will thus be seen, never herself became poorer, 
but always richer, by war. In mere literal fact, war was to 
Rome her one source of wealth. All that enormous ac- 
cumulation of public and private resources which made Rome 
rich and great, was — let the truth be nakedly stated — it was 
pure plunder. Plunder laid the foundation of all her tem- 
ples, all her state edifices, all her public pleasure-houses, all 
her palaces. The superstructure of all these was plunder. 
Outside and inside, they were garnished with plunder. 
Plunder paved her streets, her highways. Plunder under- 
girded the city with sewers, built as for subterranean rivers. 
Plunder flung bridges across the Tiber. Plunder arched her 
aqueducts, and shot them forth, in miles and miles of straight 
stone trajectory, high over the subject Campagna. It was 
plunder that robed her senators, in the awed eyes of Cineas, 
like an assembly of kings. The Roman nobles fared sumpt- 



The City and the People. 39 

uously every day on plunder. Nay, the very rabble of the 
streets subsisted on a commons of plunder. This is not rhet- 
oric. It is mere hard matter of fact. Rome was active, 
but her activity was not the activity of production. She did 
not till the ground, she did not ply the loom. That is, the 
productive industry of Rome was so little, in any kind what- 
ever, that it need not be reckoned at all. Rome's only in- 
dustry was robbery. She exported nothing. She imported 
every thing. Rome was a mighty metropolis of plunder. 
She sucked the breast of kings. 

The famous Roman Triumph was no unrelated incident 
of the national life. It was the symbol, the representative, 
the epitome, of what Rome was. It brought into vivid and 
striking demonstration to the senses the whole motive and 
method and meaning of her career. It was simply a strong 
momentary accentuation of the habitual tenor of her con- 
duct. The gorgeous procession, the holiday streets, the idly 
gaping and applauding beholders, the captive kings led in 
chains with their wives and their children, the blazoned 
names of conquered nations, the loads of glittering spoil, the 
laureled general with his vermeil-tinctured face, and that 
familiar at his side incessantly whispering in his ear, " Re- 
member that thou art a man;" the bands of musicians, the 
harlequin pantomime, whose business it was to insult the 
vanquished; the thronging soldiers, cheering or chaffing their 
leader; the attendant senators — what was this spectacle, but 
Rome herself exhibiting on the stage, Roman history drama- 
tized and enacted ? The captives sent to prison, and usually 
to death ; the multitudinous bloody gladiatorial shows that ac- 
companied — these were necessary, too; and now, half-savage, 
half-civilized, wholly heathen, Rome is fully represented in 
her Triumph, that pride of the Roman general, that joy of 
the Roman populace, that terror and dread of vanquished 
kings, that phantasmagoric instruction to history. 

Our readers may need to be reminded of a momentous 



40 P7-eparatory Latin Course in English. 



fact, not yet named, but implied throughout in Roman con- 
quest and government. That fact is, that in the end more 
than one half the population of the Roman empire — in other 
words, more than one half the population of the world then 
known — were slaves. Take that into your thought and your 
imagination. For every man, every woman, every child, liv- 
ing free, and master of self, like you, there was a man, a wom- 
an, a child, possessing no rights whatsoever that any human 
being was bound to regard. The Roman master was lord of 
his slave in the most absolute sense of lordship. He could 
not only whip him as much as he pleased, he could kill him, 
and be called in question by no one for his deed. The mis- 
ery, the sin, that this state of things meant, not less for the 
ascendant minority than for the abject majority of the human 
race, is a topic for imagination rather than for description. 
Let it not be forgotten that whatever was outwardly great in 
Rome, rested on a foundation of rapine — rapine that robbed 
not only of wealth, but of life ; that robbed of life, not only by 
death, quick and merciful, at the point of the sword, but by 
the prolonged death of life under the lash of slavery. There 
was not a stone laid in the building of Rome that did not 
represent outrage on the rights of mankind. Rome, from 
foundation to topstone, was a towering and splendid edifice 
of crime. ' How could God's earth help rocking to topple her 
to her overthrow ? Rome sat on a volcano that burned under 
her to the lowest hell. " 

The Christian moral sense instinctively and irresistibly 
speaks such language. But Christian charity no less feels 
bound to judge righteous judgment. And there is no right- 
eous judgment of ancient Rome that is not widely compre- 
hensive, comparative, and wise. 

Over against the colossal criminality which tends to make 
Rome morally bankrupt beyond hope before the conscience 
and judgment of history, there is justly to be set down to her 
credit a considerable sum of benefits conferred by her upon 



The City and the People. 41 

mankind. And, to begin with, there is this comparative ex- 
tenuation to be pleaded in her behalf. Rome was no worse 
than the other nations of antiquity, except as she was strong- 
er, shrewder, more single, more persistent, more success- 
fully wicked, than they. They were all supremely selfish, not 
less than was Rome. It happened that the selfishness of 
Rome took one direction, one direction only, and that direc- 
tion kept to the end. She wished to be mistress of the 
world, and she was willing to pay the price. This made 
Rome what she was. She devoured the nations. True. 
But the nations she devoured were, when she devoured 
them, all hard at work ambitiously devouring each other. 
Perhaps it was an alleviation, rather than an aggravation, to 
the misery of mankind, that it should be as it was. Perhaps 
it was better for the nations that they should all go together 
down one great throat stretched wide enough to pass them 
commodiously, than that they should spend ages of time in 
ineffectual attempts at alternately swallowing one another. 
There was one capacious maw within which they could all 
be at peace. Let them enter there, since otherwise they 
would be endlessly at war. 

This reflection is an immense consolation to the afflicted 
sentiment of one who reads Roman history. These wretched 
nations, that Rome so ruthlessly crushes, bruising them 
bloodily one against another, wielded helplessly in her two 
mailed hands — they might nearly as well be thus crushed by 
Rome effectively, at once and for all, as go on dashing 
themselves together in ceaseless mutual collision indecisively 
cruel, cruelly indecisive, age after age, indefinitely, forever. 

But there are offsets as well as extenuations to the charges 
against Rome. Frightful as was her injustice in governing, 
Rome yet governed more beneficently than any other ancient 
nation. She had a genius for government. Politics, not 
less than war, was her passion — if of passion, a blood that 
ran so cold as Rome's can be deemed to have been capable. 



42 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

She extended the blessing of stable government, of an ad- 
ministration of law at least comparatively just and wise, to 
all the countries she conquered. 

Further: imperfect as was the civilization of Rome, her 
civilization was yet incomparably better than the qualified 
barbarism that characterized the greater part of even the 
best of the world besides. And, after her fashion, she civ- 
ilized where she had subjugated. Or if, in subjugating, she 
encountered, as in Greece, a civilization in some respects 
more excellent than her own, she was great enough to be 
wise enough to profit by the lessons that her beaten enemies 
could teach her. Alas ! the tuition to evil that also her vassal 
panders eagerly offered — this, she was neither wise enough 
nor morally sound enough to reject. 

Again : it is to be accounted an immeasurable blessing to 
mankind that Rome made the world politically one for the 
unhindered universal spread of Christianity. This we may 
say, not only speaking as Christians, but speaking as social 
philosophers. Whether one believes Christianity or not, it is 
at least undeniable that Christianity creates the chief differ- 
ence between modern civilization and ancient. And that 
this difference might exist, it was worth while for the iron 
embrace of Rome to crush the world into one mass of em- 
pire, throughout which the Gospel could everywhere be 
preached. 

Briefly, then : First, the Roman empire was peace ; secondly, 
it was comparatively good government ; thirdly, it was civili- 
zation ; fourthly, it was the condition to Christianity of its 
diffusion through the world. Let Rome have her due of 
acknowledgment. There has not been stinted to her the 
full cup of her blame. 

We grant that the benefits thus conferred by Rome on the 
world far exceed the merits of Rome in conferring the ben- 
efits. But the optimist — that is, the believer in eventual 
good — may get, for his faith, more argument than can the 



The City and the People. 43 

pessimist — that is, the believer in eventual evil — for his, from 
the history of Rome, not, indeed, taken by itself, but taken 
in conjunction with the history of Christianity. Under this 
wide interpretation, the diffusive and permanent influence 
of Rome for good to the world must be held to overbalance 
her influence for evil. The praise, however, is due rather 
to Providence than to Rome. 

Of such a people, holding such a city, and through such 
policies of conquest and of government accomplishing such 
a career to such a resulting account, in history, of balanced 
praise and blame, we advance in the next chapter to consider 
in summary the literature. Meantime, however, a few 
words of bibliography respecting Roman history may be 
helpful. 

Those, then, of our friends who may be inclined to prose- 
cute farther than we here have enabled them to do their 
study of Roman history, will find the primer on that subject 
by Mr. M. Creighton, (republished in this country by the Ap- 
pletons,) a well-conceived and well-executed work, admirably 
adapted to the use of the general reader willing to be satis- 
fied with a greatly reduced but clear and proportional view 
of the entire field. Mr. Creighton's primer begins with 753 
B. C, that is, with the date assumed for the founding of 
Rome, and ends with 1453 A. D., that is, with the date 
marked by the final overthrow of the Eastern Empire in the 
.fall of Constantinople under the arms of the Turks. 

Such as have more leisure at their command may profit- 
ably peruse Mr. R. F. Leighton's school " History of Rome," 
published by Clark & Maynard. This is richly illustrated 
with maps and engravings. It is written with enlightened 
scholarship. Mr. Leighton's book sets out from 753 B. C, 
and comes to its stop at 476 A. D., the date commonly as- 
signed for the fall of the Western Empire. 

A larger and fuller work, prepared for the general reader, 
and therefore properly less interrupted by . divisions into 



44 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

paragraphs and by differences of type, than the foregoing 
meritorious manual of Mr. Leighton, is Liddell's " History 
of Rome," published by the Harpers. This history, be- 
ginning, like the rest, at 753 B. C, closes at 29 B. C, the 
date of the establishment of the empire. Dr. Liddell is 
the same with the associate author and compiler of the 
Greek Lexicon known as Liddell and Scott's. This history 
is a clearly-written and readable work. 

Dr. Mommsen's more expanded work, extending now to 
four considerable volumes, issued in excellent style by Charles 
Scribner's Sons, is perhaps the great work on Roman history 
to be studied by such as desire the latest and the best. 
This work may hereafter be continued by the author to in- 
clude the period of the empire ; but in its present state it 
closes with the fall of the republic. Mommsen's History 
will be more particularly referred to in the course of the 
chapter to follow this, on Caesar's Commentaries. 

Merivale's " History of the Romans " is likewise a large 
work, worthy to be commended. Sound in judgment, trust- 
worthy in scholarship, it is well written without being re- 
markably well written. It lacks brilliant and striking quali- 
ties of style. 

Dr. Arnold's works on Roman history are valuable, but 
they are incomplete. Dr. Arnold was a student and follower 
of the great German Niebuhr, (nee'boor,) who maybe said to 
have almost created ancient Roman history, as that history 
has since his time (1776-1831) been written, and must al- 
ways henceforth continue to be written. 

Gibbon's great work, " The Decline and Fall of the Ro- 
man Empire," is too well known to everybody to need char- 
acterization, or even mention. That work, however, deals, 
as its title indicates, with the later periods of Roman his- 
tory. It is learned and exhaustive, but it is overpoweringly 
long and full for any except the special student, or the gen- 
eral reader with ample leisure at command. There is an 



The City and the People. 45 

abridgment, called the " Student's Gibbon," published in a 
single volume. 

A number of romances, seeking to reproduce the life of 
the Roman empire, have lately been written in German and 
translated into English, which may serve a useful purpose to 
the student of Roman history. "Quintus Claudius," among 
these, is worthy of particular mention. Macaulay's "Frag- 
ment of a Roman Tale " is not to be forgotten. 

On the philosophy of Roman history, De Quincey has a 
striking and suggestive essay, sufficiently independent, if it 
should not even be called paradoxical, to be stimulating to 
thought. Read also De Quincey 's essay on the Caesars, 
not neglecting his notes. But the most enlightening philo- 
sophical discussion of Roman history known to the present 
writer is Montesquieu's " Greatness [the French word is not 
well translated ' Grandeur '] and Decadence of the Ro- 
mans." A translation of this work, under the English title, 
" Grandeur and Decadence of the Romans," accompanied 
with valuable notes, has recently been issued by the 
Appletons. ' 



III. 

THE LITERATURE OF ROME. 

Such of our readers as may wish to know more of Latin 
literature than we, in the following brief sketch, undertake to 
tell, can satisfy their curiosity, either by consulting some one 
or more of several accessible works expressly devoted to this 
subject, or by giving careful attention to what the general 
histories of Rome have to say about the literary productions 
of the Roman mind. " Charles Scribner's Sons republish in 
this country what is, perhaps, on the whole, the best manual 
of Latin letters, namely, Cruttwell's " History of Roman Liter- 
ature." This is written with excellent judgment and with good 



46 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

taste. The style is clear and readable. It reconciles, with 
considerable success, the popular and the scholarly traits of 
treatment. Harper & Brothers have lately re-issued a work 
in two volumes covering much the same ground. This is 
Simcox's manual, bearing the title, "History of Latin Liter- 
ature." Mr. Simcox begins, as Mr. Cruttwell does, at the be- 
ginning, but he comes down to a later date than Mr. Crutt- 
well. Marcus Au-re'li-us (121-180 A. IX) is the hither term 
of Mr. Cruttwell; while Mr. Simcox continues his account 
to Bo-e'thi-us, (470-525.) We give the preference to Mr. 
Cruttwell's book for the use of our readers. 

As we have already intimated, the period during which 
classic Latin literature, strictly so-called, came into existence 
was, in comparison to the whole life of the Roman people, 
very short. The epithet classic is somewhat arbitrarily ap- 
plied to the literature produced at Rome during a certain 
limited time, variously reckoned by various authorities, but 
fairly enough to be considered as extending from about 
80 B. C. to A. D. 108, and as thus covering one hundred and 
eighty-eight years, a little less than the space of six generations. 
Cicero begins and Tacitus (Tass'i-tus) ends this period. All 
before is ante-classic ; all after, post-classic. Cicero, or some 
might say Caesar, may be taken as marking the point of high- 
est purity and perfection in Latin diction and style. Liter- 
ature, with the Romans, was both late to spring into life, and 
early to fall into decay. The names of Roman writers 
familiar now to the popular ear are few in number, and they 
are clustered together in time, like the stars of a constellation 
in the sky. 

Liv-i-us An-dro-ni'cus was a writer of tragedy. He flour- 
ished about two hundred and forty years before Christ. But 
Livius Andronicus is a name, nothing more, and as merely a 
name, is probably, to most of our readers, unknown. We 
write the name here, not to say any thing more about the 
bearer of the name, than that Livius Andronicus may be 



The Literature of Rome. 47 

regarded as the beginner of Latin literature. This Livy, by 
the way, is not to be confounded with Livy the historian, 
who will come two centuries later, and be a very different 
man. "Andronicus " alone, a Greek appellation, was the 
earlier writer's original name. He was an Italian Greek, made 
prisoner at the Roman capture of Tarentum — prisoner and, 
by natural consequence, slave. When, afterward, he was set 
free, he adopted, according to custom, the name of his mas- 
ter, Livius. The mention of Tarentum captured will remind 
our readers of Pyrrhus, vainly summoned by the Tarentines 
to help them against Rome. It was the war between Pyr- 
rhus and Rome, you remember, that we took as the point of 
commencement for strictly authentic Roman history. The 
time was about the middle of the third century before Christ. 
It is historically significant that Roman literature should 
have been begun by a Greek. Rome conquered Greece, but 
Greece turned about and made captive her conqueror. But 
we might have got our epigram by quoting the Roman poet 
Horace himself, who says, " Captive Greece took captive her 
rude conqueror." What Livius Andronicus wrote in Latin 
was no doubt mainly translation from the writer's native 
Greek. Of his indifferent verse a few fragments only re- 
main. 

Nae'vi-us is another mere name in Latin literature — this, like- 
wise, a name now, perhaps, for the first time meeting the eyes 
of most of the readers of this volume. Against the hellen- 
izing tendency introduced by Livius, Naevius, himself also, 
like Livius, debtor to Hellenic originals, nevertheless made a 
manly, though a vain, stand for the native Roman spirit in 
Roman literature. He wrote a sort of epic on the first Punic 
war, esteemed by scholars one of the chief lost things in 
Latin literature. It contained notices of previous Roman 
history, which nothing survives to replace. Macaulay, in his 
Lays of Ancient Rome, has exercised his imagination to con- 
struct what it may be supposed that the epic of Naevius, had 



48 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

that poem escaped the chances of time, would have supplied 
to the Englishman's hand. Perhaps, if the truth were known, 
we English-speakers gain, rather than lose, by exchanging 
tradition for fancy, Naevius for Macaulay. Cicero, however, 
who had a capacity for appreciating, as great as was his 
capacity for creating, expresses strongly the delight he ex- 
perienced in reading the lost epic of Naevius. 

The next great name in Latin literature is still to us little 
more than a name. It is En'ni-us. Ennius is praised by 
Cicero, by Lu-cre'ti-us ; Virgil does not praise him, but he 
copies him ; while Horace, too, does not altogether disdain 
to acknowledge merit in his verse. Ennius was a thorough- 
going hellenizer. His influence and example decisively 
fixed the form of the Latin poetry, and so, we may say, of 
the Latin language. It long remained a part of the conserva- 
tism and pride of the Roman people, to keep alive portions, 
at least, of the poetry of Ennius. It is tantalizing to think 
that Ennius was lost to the world only so long ago as the 
thirteenth century. 

We may skip other names after Ennius, until we come to 
names as familiar as those of Plau'tus and Ter'ence. These 
two were the great Roman writers of comedy. Naevius had 
done something in the line of the comic drama, but the truly 
indigenous literary product, like that which Naevius at- 
tempted to furnish, seemed somehow never to thrive in 
Rome. Plautus and Terence won their triumphs by boldly 
importing their intellectual wares from Greece. Of Terence, 
Julius Caesar, in a celebrated epigram, spoke slightingly, as 
but " a half-Menander." The epigrammatist named thus the 
Greek (Menan'der) from whom the Roman, if Roman indeed 
he is to be called — for Terence was a native of Carthage — 
purveyed his comedies. These two writers, Plautus and 
Terence, will furnish their full share of what our readers may 
promise themselves most to enjoy, in the companion volume 
to the present, namely, that devoted to representing the 



The Literature of Rome. 49 

college or university course in Latin. The two were partly- 
contemporary, but Plautus was Terence's senior. The senior 
was, of the two, the coarser, but so the more characteristic- 
ally Roman, the more original, and, perhaps, the abler. Ter- 
ence, however, died when hardly more than a youth, so that 
what we have from his hand was but the first-fruits of his 
early-ripe genius. Plautus lived, and, on the whole, pros- 
pered, to a good old age. Both these dramatists reflected a 
civilization that was full of iniquity. Their reflections, of 
course, are tainted accordingly. Roman life and manners, 
beginning, through superfluous wealth and, we grieve to say 
it, through corrupting influence and example imported from 
Greece, to show deterioration from their ancient simplicity 
and comparative virtue, are vividly portrayed in the comedies 
of Plautus and of Terence. Our readers will relish the ex- 
tracts in store for them from these writers. The relish, how- 
ever, will be pungent with pain as well as with pleasure. 
The lines themselves that the authors wrote will amuse you, 
but you will be saddened with what you read between the 
lines. You may safely reckon, while tasting this mingled 
relish, on getting at the same time a better idea of what 
Roman civilization really was, than many a laborious page of 
history might yield, duly studied under a sense, on your part, 
of so much necessary work conscientiously performed. 

Another important source of knowledge respecting the 
every-day life and morality of the ancient Romans, is to be 
found in the Satires which their own writers produced. The 
satire may be said to be a form of composition in verse orig- 
inal with Rome. In satire, more naturally by far than in 
comedy, the Roman genius could unbend from its habitual 
and characteristic severity. Perhaps Roman satire was 
hardly, to the Romans, an unbending from severity ; say, 
rather, it was with them a way of giving loose to severity. 
At all events, satire is a kind of verse in which the Romans 

distance all competitors. 
3 



50 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Verse, but not poetry, observe, we call the Roman satire. 
Indeed, the wit, the scorn, the ridicule, which, in any lan- 
guage, make the life of the satire, are hardly compatible 
with poetry. It was by no means, therefore, because the 
satire is of its own nature poetical, that, among the Romans, 
the satire chose for itself verse as its form of expression. It 
was rather for the curious reason that, when satire began, 
verse was a literary vehicle of thought already prepared to 
the hand of the satirical writer, while prose had yet to be in- 
vented. Curious we call it, and our readers will agree with 
us in feeling it to be curious, that so difficult a form of com- 
position as verse should precede prose in the first develop- 
ment of a national literature. This, however, seems to be a 
general fact in literary history. It has even been suggested 
that you may measure the advance of a people in the liter- 
ary art by the degree to which prose has secured for itself 
among them an expansion of its sphere. Let us trust, we 
that love poetry, that poetry is not, one day, in the triumph- 
ant perfection of literature, to be quite swallowed up. By 
the way, is there, in this line of thought, a light thrown on 
Coleridge's noteworthy sentence of exclamation at what he 
calls the " wonderfulness of prose " ? 

The spirit of satire is very pervasive throughout Latin lit- 
erature. Cato the Censor was a great satirist in his writing, 
but especially in his speech. That tongue of his was as a 
scourge for the chastisement of the public. Lucretius, poetic 
interpreter to the Romans, of philosophic Epicurus the 
Greek, is highly satirical. Seneca was a moralist, but he 
moralized satirically. As for Tacitus, our readers in due 
time shall see for themselves how the ink with which that 
great historian wrote was embittered with the gall of the 
satirist. Of the classic Roman satire Lu-cil'ius (148-103 B.C.) 
was the creator. The learned world has suffered a great loss 
in losing Lucilius. He satirized, not to vent his own spleen, 
but to chastise the vices of society, and thus to help give 



The Literature of Rome. 51 

virtue its chance among men. But the great Roman mas- 
ters of satire are Horace and Ju'ven-al. These two writers 
not only wrote nobly themselves, but they have been the 
cause of much noble writing, done long since their day, by 
others, both in French and in English. French Boileau and 
English Dryden and Pope, especially, with Johnson too, have 
transfused the essential spirit of Horace and Juvenal into 
brilliant imitative satires, dealing with the follies and vices of 
modern contemporary life. For some specimens of the sa- 
tirical work of the Englishmen named — as being, perhaps, for 
our purpose in this series of volumes, better than exclusive 
mere translation would be — we shall hereafter try to find 
room. That will be when we come to representing Horace 
and Juvenal, in the volume on Latin literature to follow this. 
Our readers may prepare their palates for a strong sapor of 
spice. 

To Cato, famous always and everywhere as Cato the 
Censor, may be attributed the merit of being the founder or 
former of Latin prose. For this service to Latin literature, 
Cato's merit is as distinctive and as indisputable, as is the 
merit of Ennius for a corresponding influence exercised in 
fixing the mold of Latin verse. But while Ennius hellen- 
ized, that is, followed Greek models, Cato, in principle and 
in practice, was stanchly Roman. There is something whim- 
sical in the fact that one of the great creators of Roman 
literature should have been, as Cato undoubtedly was, quite 
sincerely and cordially a despiser of literature. Cato wrote 
to decry writing, as Carlyle lately deafened us all to recom- 
mend silence. Unhappily, Cato is now mainly but a tradi- 
tion in Latin letters. We have left from his hand nothing 
entire, except a treatise on farming, and even this is edited 
somewhat. Cato wrote an important historical work, the 
loss of which leaves an irreparable breach in the continuity 
of primitive Roman story. Cato is also named for praise 
by Cicero as the first Roman orator worthy of that title. 



52 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Oratory, from early times down to the establishment of the 
empire — true oratory the empire extinguished — was a favor- 
ite form of intellectual activity among the Romans. It has 
happened, however, and this from the nature of things, that 
of the immense volume of an eloquence hardly perhaps, in 
the aggregate, equaled by that of any other nation, ancient 
or modern, comparatively little remains to justify the fame 
which Roman oratory traditionally enjoys. The orator's 
triumph, as it is the most intense, is likewise the most mo- 
mentary of all intellectual victories. Cicero, among Romans, 
reigns alone, in glorious companionship with Demosthenes 
among Greeks, as one of the two undisputedly greatest mas- 
ters of human speech that have ever appeared on the planet. 
yEschines (Es'ki-neez) survives, in equivocal renown, as foil 
to Demosthenes — Hortensius enjoying a similar privilege 
of continued remembrance in connection with Cicero. 
While of ^Eschines, however, we still have the really brill- 
iant speech which provoked from his victorious rival that 
"bright consummate flower" of eloquence, the oration on 
the Crown, nothing remains of Hortensius but the splendid 
tradition of his fame. For other Roman orators, there are the 
brothers Gracchi, (Grak'ki,) Crassus, and that universal man, 
not less capable of great words than of great deeds, Julius 
Caesar. Nor must we forget Mark Antony. This orator's 
masterpiece, the funeral discourse on murdered Caesar, per- 
ished long ago, but you may still study it in the form in 
which the creative imagination and easy omnipotence in ex- 
pression of Shakespeare have perhaps more than restored it. 
Read Antony in the tragedy of "Julius Caesar," and, if you are 
an orator, hope that what you utter in the supreme moment 
of your career may die, to enjoy a like resurrection. The 
names that we have last mentioned, added to those of Cato, 
Cicero, Hortensius, sufficiently suggest the roll-call of illus- 
trious orators that Rome, before eloquence died with liberty in 
Rome, could boast, in not unsuccessful rivalship with Greece. 



The Literature of Rome. 53 

Cato, as founder of history for Rome, had a following not 
less distinguished than that which, as you have seen, he drew 
after him as founder of oratory. When we have mentioned, 
first, Csesar, that name appearing so often, and always among 
the foremost, when you recall the glories of Rome in differ- 
ent spheres of achievement ; next, Sallust, emulating but 
hardly rivaling Thucydides in force and in point ; then 
Livy, of the " pictured page," with his lost books, perhaps 
the chief theme of hopeless deploring for the lovers of 
classical literature and the students of Roman antiquity ; 
and, fourth, Tacitus, grave, severe, pathetic — but loftily, in- 
dignantly pathetic, with pathos made bitter and virile by 
sarcasm — illustrating in his practice that definition of history 
which calls it philosophy teaching by example, and so plac- 
ing himself chronologically second in the line, in which 
Thucydides stands first, of philosophical historians — when, 
we say, we have mentioned these four names, we have not, 
indeed, exhausted, but we have adequately suggested, the 
list of Roman historical writers. Cornelius Nepos — and the 
same is true of Suetonius — was a biographer rather than a 
historian. Suetonius deserves higher regard ; but the pre- 
tensions of Nepos, as a man of letters, are humble, and what 
survives of his work is rather tame reading. 

It was reserved for the age of Augustus to produce the 
great epic of Rome, the ^Ene'id of Virgil. This poem, like 
the Georgics of the same author, seems to have had a patri- 
otic inspiration, inspiration genuinely the poet's, though, per- 
haps, originally communicated from no less august a source 
than the Roman emperor himself. It was not simply ad- 
dressed to the national feeling of Rome, for the purpose of 
flattering that feeling to the gain of the poet. It was de- 
signed to create and excite national feeling, or rather to re- 
vive and restore the national feeling which the long civil wars 
had done so much to extinguish. Whatever the merits of the 
poem, the iEneid has had a fortune of fame and of influence 



54 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

that pairs it, in unchallenged pre-eminence, with the Iliad 
of Homer. With Virgil was matched and contrasted, in a 
life-long friendship honorable and glorious to both, a very- 
different poet — by eminence the Roman poet of society and 
manners — Horace, of a fame fulfilling his own celebrated 
boast and prediction concerning himself: " I have reared for 
myself a monument more enduring than brass." Horace has 
a peculiar persisting modernness of manner that keeps him 
perhaps the most read and the most quoted of all ancient 
poets. 

In connection with Virgil and Horace, let us make mention, 
in one word, of a man who, producing, indeed, no valuable 
literature himself, became, nevertheless, alike by his initiative, 
by his taste, and by his munificence, to such an extent the 
cause to others of their producing of literature, that his very- 
name is now an immortal synonym for enlightened and gener- 
ous patronage of culture. If you wish to dignify by a name 
some wise and liberal encourager of intellectual activity you 
call him a Mse-ce'nas. Augustus himself surpassed his minis- 
ter Maecenas in patronizing genius, only as the sovereign may 
always surpass the subject. Ovid, however, less happy than 
Virgil and Horace, felt the weight of imperial displeasure. 
Banished from Rome by Augustus, he became as famous to 
all time for his unmanly tears in exile, as he had been before 
for his much-appreciated verse. 

Ovid in Pontus, puling for his Rome, 

is the merciless line in which Mr. Lowell, in his " Cathedral," 
pillories him for the contempt of mankind. 

We must not close this rapid and summary survey of Latin 
literature without remarking that it was proper of the Roman 
genius to produce a copious literature about literature, in the 
form of grammatical, rhetorical, and critical treatises. Be- 
sides Varro, a luminous as well as voluminous author, much 
lauded by Cicero, whose works, however valuable for matter, 



The Literature of Roifie. 55 

lacked every charm of manner, we name here only Quin-til'i- 
an, the writer on rhetoric — who, perhaps, from his store will 
supply us with material for enriching the variety and in- 
structiveness of future pages of the present series of vol- 
umes. 

Our readers can easily see that, with a magazine of re- 
sources accessible, so large and so various as is the literature 
thus imperfectly described, it will be next to impossible not 
to draw for our use what, properly presented, will make up a 
full and an appetizing intellectual feast. 

Now forward with but one more brief stage of delay, to 
the proof. 



IV. 
A WORD OR TWO OF ADVICE. 

In concluding the previous chapter our impulse was to 
begin at once here with something highly interesting. This, 
in our next chapter, we shall show that we could very easily 
have done. On the whole, however, we decide to keep that 
impulse in check, until we shall first have given certain of 
our readers some good advice about their proper course of 
proceeding. 

The advice to be submitted is, perhaps, hardly more than 
suggestion ; for no one need follow it who is not that way in- 
clined. In fact, those readers with whom good advice is a 
favorite aversion may, if they like, just drop the thread right 
here, to take it up again unbroken at the beginning of the 
next chapter. To these last readers nothing probably will 
be lost by their skipping of a few pages here, except barely 
the good advice itself contained therein — small loss that, 
since they would not in any case have been apt, against their 
liking, to follow the good advice, and so get the resultant 
practical benefit aimed at in their behalf. No offense, we trust, 



5 6 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

even to these readers — for we quite understand that our office 
here is to make Latin literature easy, and not in general to 
give good advice. 

We speak, then, for the moment, to such among our readers 
as, not being classically educated, and not expecting to be, 
would, nevertheless, like, to some small degree, to get the 
secret of the Latin language itself, in addition to the Latin 
literature — so far, at least, that when, for example, they 
chance in reading aloud to come upon a Latin word or 
phrase used by an English writer, they need not stumble 
and say Jerusalem ; or when, for another example, to 
tongue's tip springs some pat quotation in Latin, they need 
Tiot hold the volunteer back, for fear they shall forsooth 
commit a dreadful solecism by missing unawares a mysterious 
concord of gender, number, or case. Some readers, too, 
there will be — parents, perhaps, or older brothers or sisters — 
who, to the reasons already suggested for liking to know a 
little Latin, will add also the wish to keep in sympathetic 
communication with fortunate kinsman or kinswoman enjoy- 
ing the privilege of education at academy or college. To all 
readers, whatever their private motive, who would gladly fur- 
nish themselves with a modest, but serviceable, smatter of 
Latin, we take great pleasure in saying, Your wish can be 
gratified, and that without any very formidable cost of time 
or pains on your part. You have no new alphabet to learn. 
A Latin page does not, like a Greek, bristle to you with 
Procul, procul, Off, off, multitudinously horrid in the very 
aspect of the letters ! The words look familiar and inviting. 
Some of them carry their meaning on their face. 

Very well; go at it, nothing doubting. Take up any Latin 
grammar at hazard, or first book in Latin. Read it unafraid. 
Skip paragraphs, pages even, that look too learned and dry, 
and by no means accuse yourselves of being superficial for 
doing so. Rather secretly take pleasure in thinking that 
you know how to "refuse the prickle, and assume the rose." 



A Word or Two of Advice. 57 

Get yourself thus easily led up to the declensions, so-called, 
of the Latin nouns. Fall afoul of these, and master them. 
It is really not a very serious affair. You can make sing- 
song of the task, if you like, and chant it as accompaniment 
to any necessary other employment you may happen to have 
in hand — any employment, we mean, that will leave your 
mind a little at leisure to be, as Mrs. Browning cheerfully 
puts it, " singing at a work apart." Well, in the same way 
take a turn at the adjectives and pronouns, which, as you 
will with pleasure observe, have a trick of following the 
phases of the nouns, making it thus quite easy for you to 
master them. Once more unto the breach, dear friends, and 
storm the four conjugations of the Latin verbs. There, that 
is all — only, of course, you can, you know, if you find you 
rather like Latin grammar, look, as much as pleases you, at 
the rules of syntax. But you will now have learned enough 
Latin to serve several useful ends. 

The mere guidance of your ear, thus grown familiar with 
the forms of the nouns, pronouns, and adjectives, shifting 
rhythmically down through their several cases and numbers, 
will save you from the embarrassment of making, for instance, 
such a ludicrous blunder as that of the lady who spoke to a 
friend of ours about taking a plunge in medias rebus — when 
she meant, with easy command of classic quotation, to mus- 
ter in that veteran conscript, our old acquaintance, in medias 
res, who, perhaps some readers will remember, graced, with 
well-accustomed step, the ranks of our own array in the vol- 
ume on Greek literature preceding this. Lexicon, not gram- 
mar, was wanting to the traveler who, tired of sea, declared 
himself glad to set foot once more on terra cotta. (If, now, 
that traveler had been but a homesick Neapolitan gentle- 
man, landing nigh the base of Mount Vesuvius, with its 
burnt volcanic soil — terra cotta, that is, baked or cooked 
earth — would not have been in him so very bad a term to 

express his sentiment of whimsical pathetic gladness in the 
3* 



58 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

"home return." Alas! we fear the traveler was a hapless 
American, born too soon to have had the benefit of these 
books ; though even to such a traveler a timely recollection 
of his mother tongue should have served to point out that 
terra firma was the natural antithesis desired to the tumbling 
and wallowing sea. It is fair, finally, to advise our readers 
that terra cotta is not true Latin at all, but Italian, " that soft 
bastard Latin," to use Byron's affectionate descriptive phrase.) 

A very ingenious device for acquiring something like ver- 
nacular familiarity with a foreign language, through much 
practice in repetition of words and phrases, is that of Sauveur. 
A spirited movement toward the general introduction of this 
plan, modified somewhat, in application to Latin, has recently 
been started by Professor E. S. Shumway, of the State Nor- 
mal School at Potsdam, in New York. This enlightened 
and enterprising classical teacher publishes an admirable 
little monthly magazine, entitled "Latine," printed almost 
wholly in Latin, which, with much interesting and instruct- 
ive matter besides, furnishes, from number to number, co- 
pious and well-prepared specimen exercises in exemplification 
of this method. 

Some readers of this chapter may be incited by what we 

say to prosecute, still farther than we have now suggested, 

their study of Latin. To any such reader we would say, If 

your age and your circumstances permit, by all means take 

the regular way of doing this. Go to a good school, and fit 

yourself for college. Then accomplish a college course and 

be a graduate. There is no other plan for you so wise as 

this. Do not undertake to educate yourself, if it is possible 

for you to get yourself educated. There will be quite enough 

of self-educating for you to do in getting yourself properly 

educated. 

A little learning is a dangerous tiling, 

sings Pope, with excellently good wisdom, in very moder- 
ately good poetry. Still, we believe all our readers may 



A Word or Two of Advice. 59 

safely venture on knowing as much as we have now sug- 
gested about the Latin language. With this not cumbrous 
equipment of knowledge, not one, we dare warrant, of them 
all will make the mistake of setting up for a critical Latin 
scholar. We should even hope that prudence and modesty- 
would be the fruit, full rather than conceit and audacity. 

As to pronunciation of Latin, there are wide diver- 
gences of practice, and the divergences of theory are not 
slight. Theoretically, what is called the Roman pronuncia- 
tion is, we suppose, the nearest approximation yet made to 
the orthoepy of the ancient Romans themselves. This pro- 
nunciation is gaining ground. The present writer remembers 
the time when the college at which he was then student stood 
alone among American colleges in adopting, under the in- 
trepid lead of that admirable instructor, Professor J. F. Rich- 
ardson, the Roman method of pronouncing Latin. This 
method our readers need not take even the very little trouble 
it would require to master. Nor had they better undertake 
the so-called Continental method. Just adhere to the per- 
verse old English method, the very worst, probably, in itself 
of all methods, but among English-speakers in possession 
still, to such an extent that, for practical purposes, it is to 
you for the present the best. The differences of the different 
systems of Latin orthoepy concern both the vowels and the 
consonants. We cannot here profitably consume space to 
indicate what even the chief differences are. 

There is one point, however, in which all methods agree, 
and that is a point in which they all agree to differ from the 
usage that obtains in the pronunciation of the English 
tongue. According to any recognized method of pronounc- 
ing Latin, every several vowel or diphthong makes a sylla- 
ble. There are no silent vowels in Latin. Simply remember 
this principle, and you will be saved from very many of the 
mistakes that, in pronouncing Latin, an English speaker is 
likely to make. Take the Latin expressions, familiar to 



60 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

every one in English, ex tempore^ pro tei?ipore. To say, ex 
tem'pore, pro tempore, in three syllables, is barbarous. Make 
four syllables — ex tempo-re, pro tempo-re. So of sine die. 
Make four syllables, two to each word — sine di'e. 

Again, all methods of Latin pronunciation agree in observ- 
ing carefully what is called quantity. If the next to the last, 
that is, the penultimate, syllable in any word is long, that 
syllable receives the accent. Whether a given syllable is 
long or short you cannot, in all cases, at sight determine. 
If the vowel is a diphthong, the syllable containing it is in- 
variably long ; for example, Athenae'um, not Athe'nseum. 
This, likewise, almost invariably holds true: If the vowel in a 
syllable is followed by two consecutive consonants the sylla- 
ble is long. Thus Bayard Taylor made a slip in so versifying 
a passage in his translation of Goethe's (pronounced very 
nearly as Gur'tur, with the r sound in both syllables omitted) 
" Faust," that you have to accent mag'ister on the first syl- 
lable. It is a case in which the penult is long by two con- 
secutive consonants, s and /, following the vowel — magister. 
Libert'as, volufit'as, volupt'as, are words falling under the 
same rule, though likely to be misaccented by English 
speakers. This is the principle on which Worcester, with 
the other best English orthoepists, pronounces demonstrate, 
illus'trate, devastate, etc., instead of demonstrate, il'lustrate, 
dev'astate, etc. Your Latin lexicon, you will find, in doubt- 
ful cases marks the principal vowels in each word with their 
proper quantity. Heed these marks scrupulously, if you 
desire to be correct in your quantity — a very important test 
of good Latin scholarship. 

A good idea would be, for all our readers of the class here 
particularly addressed, to familiarize themselves with the 
quotations from Latin given, for instance, in the dictionary, 
Webster's or Worcester's, which they use. A little attention 
to this list, bestowed daily for a week, would probably suf- 
fice. The result would be not only a convenient addition to 



A Word or Two of Advice. 61 

your stock of knowledge, in the understanding of these spe- 
cific Latin words and phrases, but beyond that a certain serv- 
iceable conversance with the Latin idiom of expression in 
general. Get the quotations, and the English renderings of 
the quotations, in both ways ; that is, so that, given the Latin, 
the English will be ready on your tongue ; and, conversely, 
so that, the English given, you can instantly respond with 
the Latin. Do not, by the way, assume that the English 
equivalents given are always word-for-word translations of 
the Latin. Use a Latin lexicon, if you wish to be sure of the 
meaning of a particular word. The sense of command, ac- 
quired through this simple process of memorizing, over a 
little stock of Latin words and phrases, will yield to you a 
satisfaction more than worth the trifling pains it will cost. 
Professor Blackie in his little book, " Self-Culture," has some 
hints worth attention on method in acquiring foreign lan- 
guages. 

One item more of advice, and we have done. Begin now 
watchfully to note the obvious derivations of English words 
from Latin, that you have been all your life in the habit of 
passing over without heed. You can make your own native 
language half subserve the purpose of a lexicon to ordinary 
Latin prose. For your help in doing this, consult your English 
lexicon, in which you have given, along with the definitions, 
the etymologies of the words defined. Very interesting it 
will be to you, very instructive as well, to take some particu- 
lar selected word and, tracing it from one language to an- 
other, see, with what changes of form suffered in several 
different languages, that word may nevertheless remain sub- 
stantially and recognizably the same. To illustrate, the 
English word heart, you probably never thought of as the 
same with the Latin word cor, although to be cordial and to 
be hearty would in your mouth be equivalent expressions. But 
observe, when you say "heart," you can breathe the h sound in 
the word as hard and gutturally as you please. Breathing 



62 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

it very roughly, somewhat as if you were clearing your throat, 
you make the h almost like a k rather softly uttered. Broad- 
en the vowel sound a, and you approximate the sound o. 
Now leave off the t final, and you are speaking tolerable 
Latin, when, with these changes, you say heart. The Greek 
equivalent word is kardia, the German word is hertz, the 
Sanskrit word is hrid — all closely related, one to another. 
The parent word is the Sanskrit, as the Sanskrit is the 
parent language. Through some such simple illustration as 
this, one comes to conceive more vividly what philologists 
mean by their talk of Indo-European languages, that is, lan- 
guages originated in India, where Sanskrit used to be spoken, 
and thence spreading over Europe. 

Furthermore, this single example supplies by suggestion 
two or three principles under which changes may take place 
in words, as the words pass from one language to another. 
First, observe, vowels may be very freely interchanged. 
Secondly, certain kindred consonants may relieve one another 
at will. Thirdly, letters may, within certain ascertainable 
limits, be mutually transposed. 

Now, let watchful readers remark, all this philological 
learning of ours is capable of being verified by reference to so 
accessible a book as Webster's Dictionary unabridged: see 
the word heart. Make the most of your dictionaries. 
Comparative philology, to be sure, is not so perfectly easy 
a science that we could conscientiously recommend to 
any reader to profess himself a specialist in it, without 
much move than merely incidental and diverting atten- 
tion paid to the subject in unabridged English dictionaries. 
For all that, however, is it not pleasant to see vistas opened 
here and there to the light, where nothing but impenetrable 
darkness presented itself before ? You feel like a soul un- 
imprisoned. Your horizon widens around you. You breathe 
an ampler air. 

In this released spirit, and enjoying it to the full, you that 



A Word or Two of Advice. 63 

actually follow the advice which, we trust, you have now 
been reading, ma} r go on in company with the rest who, alas 
for them ! made a skip of the present chapter — and take up 
what comes after, with as much greater satisfaction than can 
belong to those others as your humility and enterprise are 
greater than theirs. 



V. 
THE LATIN READER. 

We have not thought it worth while to spend time in any 
detailed mention of the numerous books that have been 
prepared by enterprising authors, to facilitate the way 
of beginners in Latin. It will be sufficient to say that 
the publishing houses named in our " Preparatory Greek 
Course in English," with other houses of like rank, may be 
applied to for descriptive catalogues of their issues, with all 
confidence on the part of the reader that he will not go 
amiss in selecting for himself his manual from the lists which 
they offer abundantly to his choice. Harkness's series of 
books in Latin are excellent, and the same may be said of 
Allen and Greenough's, with Leighton's introductory book, 
"Latin Lessons," referring to the grammar of the Latin 
series. Leighton's manual has a brief and clear explanation 
of the two methods, English and Roman, of pronouncing 
Latin. The later beginning-books in Latin have, as a rule, 
much the advantage in point of method over their old-time 
predecessors. The " Historia Sacra," it may interest some 
readers to know, was a book of auld lang syne made up of 
passages from the Bible, translated into Latin. We say of 
auld lang syne, for this text-book is now, we suppose, to be 
classed among the things that were. It well served its turn 
for many in its day. Old " Ainsworth's Dictionary," too, is 
nearly or quite superseded by more modern dictionaries 



64 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

much better than that. Our readers will find the Latin dic- 
tionary published last by the Harpers the fullest and best. 
A smaller and less expensive work, easy to carry and easy 
to handle, exceedingly compendious, and for all ordinary 
purposes of mere translation quite sufficient, is White's Dic- 
tionary, published in this country by Ginn, Heath, & Co. 
White's Dictionary has two parts, Latin-English and English- 
Latin, to be bought, we believe, either separately or together. 
The Latin-English gives the Latin words in alphabetical 
order, with their equivalents in English, while the English- 
Latin proceeds conversely. There are to be had editions of 
the various authors most commonly read in the preparatory 
Latin course, containing, in connection with the text itself, 
(and with the explanatory notes almost always accompanying 
the texts,) special lexicons, partial, indeed, but full enough 
for the satisfactory rendering of the particular works or selec- 
tions to which they severally appertain. Greenough's lexicon 
to Virgil is worthy of particular mention, not only as being 
an admirable piece of work, but as being obtainable either 
with or without the text for which it is prepared. These 
special lexicons will in many cases make unnecessary the 
purchase of larger and more costly dictionaries. Readers, 
however, who can conveniently do so, will act wisely to pos- 
sess themselves of the best. 

And now for the Latin Reader. The Latin Reader is a 
book compiled very much after the fashion of the Reader in 
Greek, with which, in the preceding volume, our friends 
had, many of them, an opportunity of becoming somewhat 
acquainted. The contents of the book vary according to 
the choice made by the particular editor or compiler. Any 
Latin Reader, however, is pretty sure, like any Greek, to 
contain its share of fables, of anecdotes, of historical frag- 
ments, of mythology, of biography. The collection has thus 
almost always a good spice of variety. The tyro is con- 
stantly allured along the paths of Latin lore by some 



The Latin Reader. 65 



appetizing bait, of tale, of witty wisdom, held out before him, 
in every succeeding paragraph which, by dint of much turn- 
ing and thumbing of the leaves of his lexicon, he slowly 
comes to understand, with more or with less of distinct and 
certain comprehension. The sweet juice of the meaning is 
usually well diluted in the youthful student's mouth with the 
secretions of his own mental idiosyncrasy, excited to flow by 
the long suspense of ruminant mastication necessary before 
the mingled product is ready to be swallowed and entered 
into his hungry individual circulation. A rather tantaliz- 
ing process — for the present, but — et haec olhn meminisse, 
"to remember even these things afterward," as Virgil has it, 
in his memory-haunting phrase ! On the whole, the Latin 
Reader (ask any college graduate) is saturate with pleasurable 
association. And indeed the book is a genuinely interesting 
one. 

Still, our readers, unless we should do a little managing for 
them in this matter, would be apt to feel that, in comparison 
of the Latin Reader with the Greek, there was, when both 
were done into English, surprisingly little difference between 
the two ; and the truth is that, already, even with the Latin 
Reader, the Roman genius begins to be displayed, in its lit- 
erary production, very dependent on the Greek. The same 
fables recur, with naturalized Greek ^Esop for putative father 
of them all. The anecdotes are many of them concerning 
Greek personages and incidents. 

Now it would be quite fair to Roman literary fame to let 
this imitative character of the Roman literature everywhere 
fully appear in these pages. There would be also the ad- 
vantage to our readers of seeing for themselves from the 
start how Rome was well content to echo Greece in letters. 
On the other hand, however, this book of ours, following, as 
it properly does, in order of appearance, the corresponding 
one in Greek, might thus be, at least in the present chapter, 
somewhat less entertaining than, for our readers' sake, we 



66 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

are resolved, if we can, to make it. So, the advantage just 
now named being mainly saved to our friends by our merely 
having named it, we shall choose to give here, from the 
contents of the Latin Reader, only such material, and that 
in very brief exemplification, as may be most differenced 
from the Greek, and most racy of the native Roman 
character. 

There was, a century or so ago, a compilation made from 
various Latin writers, entitled " Viri Romae," which formerly 
was much used by beginners in the study of the language. 
This compilation would, of course, from the character prom- 
ised in its title, be highly flavored with the authentic Roman 
life and spirit. But Livy, for instance — one of the writers 
upon whom, with Valerius Maximus and others, the volume 
referred to draws for its material — is too important a creator 
of Roman literature not to be represented more liberally 
than in the fragmentary way of excerpts such as could find 
room in a beginning-book in Latin. 

Cornelius Nepos, (about 50 B. C.,) again, is a simple, vir- 
tuously-disposed biographer, who has been widely used to 
give learners their start in construing Latin. This, notwith- 
standing that, judged by the standard of Cicero, Nepos vio- 
lates sometimes the purest and best Latinity. Conscientious 
editors get along with that objection by duly warning the 
endangered tyro (absurdly safe already he, from all literary 
infection whatsoever, bad and good alike !) against his au- 
thor's slips in style. Nepos, however, unlike Livy, might be 
fairly enough presented piecemeal, both because that is the 
only state in which he at present exists for us, and because 
his rank in letters is very humble. But as to Nepos, good, 
kind, insipid Nepos, it is doubtful whether he is really good 
enough to merit being presented at all to our friends, even in 
our Englished Latin Reader. 

Let us begin with a story exceedingly well invented, if not 
true. Perhaps the story might be described as founded on 



The Latin Reader. 67 



fact. The incidents, taken together, are a little too entirely 
satisfactory to have happened just so in every circumstance. 
But here is the story as the Latin Reader gives it. Our 
readers need only be reminded that Actium was one of the 
great decisive battles of the world, and that it was fought 
between Augustus Caesar and Mark Antony, with event in 
favor of Caesar. We translate, a little awkwardly perhaps, 
with pretty close literalness : 

When, the victory at Actium having been won, Augustus was making 
his entry into Rome, there met him, in the number of those who were 
offering their congratulations, a certain artisan, with a raven which he 
had taught to say, " Long live Csesar, victor, emperor ! " Caesar, struck 
with admiration of so courteous a bird, bought it for twenty thousand 
sesterces, [nearly a thousand dollars.] A partner of the artisan, whom 
no share of the imperial liberality had reached, assured Caesar that he 
had a different raven, which, accordingly, he directed should be brought. 
The raven being brought uttered the words which he had taught it, 
"Long live the victor, the emperor, Antony!" In no degree offended 
at this, Augustus deemed it sufficient to direct that the teacher of the 
ravens share the reward received with his companion. 

Similarly saluted by a parrot, he ordered that to be bought. Admir- 
ing the same thing in a magpie, he purchased that also. 

The example incited a poor shoemaker to train a raven to a like salu- 
tation ; but as it did not make very good proficiency, he fell into the way 
of saying frequently to the bird not replying, "It is labor and outlay 
lost." At length, however, the raven came to say the salutation taught. 
Hearing this as he passed, Augustus responded, " I have a sufficient 
number of such saluters at my house." Thereupon the raven added 
those words in which he was accustomed to hear his master complaining, 
"It is labor and outlay lost." At this Caesar laughed, and directed to 
have the bird bought at the highest price of all." 

Here is that fine story, now worn threadbare, of the Ro- 
man matron, Cornelia : 

Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, when a Campanian lady, guest at her 
house, was displaying to her her jewels, very beautiful ones, kept the 
conversation on that subject in progress till her sons returned from school. 
"And these," then she said, "are my jewels." 



68 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

There is no story like the foregoing told of a Greek moth- 
er. The nearest approach to it — and the interval of differ- 
ence is long — would perhaps be the narrative of some inci- 
dent, such as our readers will remember from the Prepara- 
tory Greek Course in English, of a Spartan mother's brave 
cheer to her boy, it may be, bound to battle, or, it may be, 
come out of battle lame with glorious wound. The truth 
is, the Greeks had not so much domestic life, and not so 
much virtue of kindred affection, as had the Romans. 
The wife, the mother, the woman, was more at Rome than 
in Greece. This, in the earlier and purer period of Roman 
history, the period, that is to say, before conquered Greece, 
herself grown degenerate now, had begun to corrupt her 
conqueror. 

By the way, simply interpreting the sons backward by such 
a mother as the Cornelia of this anecdote, shall we not, with 
some confidence, hold the Gracchi to have been rather pa- 
triots than demagogues ? Demagogues should have a differ- 
ent mother from the mother of the Gracchi. 

There is a touching story of the early Christian Church, 
which associates itself naturally with the foregoing legend 
of Roman Cornelia. After the Christian bishop, Sixtus, had 
suffered martyrdom, his deacon was ordered to produce the 
treasures of the Church for surrender to the civil authorities. 
The deacon assembled the poor whom the Church nourished, 
and, exhibiting them to the prefect, said to him, " Here are 
the Church's treasures! " Pagan Cornelia had, perhaps, fur- 
nished to the Christian deacon the model of his unanswer- 
able reply. 

We did not, our readers will bear us witness, spare the 
Roman character in our sketch of the Roman history. Now 
let our readers again bear us witness that we are even more 
than fair in giving the Roman character its chance to redeem 
itself to them, in noble anecdote and instance. Is not the 
following a wholesome example of sturdy virtue? 



The Latin Reader. 69 



Publius Rutilius Rufus, standing out against the unjust importunity 
of a certain friend of his, and by him very indignantly upbraided with, 
"Of what use, then, to me is your friendship, if you do not do what 
I ask ? " said, ' ' Nay, of what use to me yours, if, on your account, I 
act unjustly ? " 

Rutilius was an incorruptible Roman aristocrat; and as 
for the nameless gentleman in the case, we know nothing 
whatever to his advantage, except that he was friend to 
Rutilius. 

Augustus Caesar was a highly religious politician ; that is, 
he greatly believed in religion — for people in general. He 
patronized religion, as he patronized literature, for the benefit 
of the state. Of the state, we say, but the state was a syno- 
nym for himself; for you must remember that Augustus was 
the first Roman fairly entitled to have stolen from Louis XIV., 
of France, his famous words, " The state, it is I myself." 
Perhaps the following not very warmly spiced anecdote of 
great Scipio Africanus was put first into useful popular cir- 
culation at the provident hint of astute Augustus. It reads 
so like an intended good example. It is less piquant, but it 
almost reminds you, in its obvious moral aim, of that national 
anecdote of our own about good little George Washington and 
his hatchet. Convert it, and baptize it into Christianity, and 
it still will do in part to live by : 

Scipio Africanus would never engage in public business until he had 
offered prayer in the temple of Jupiter. For this reason he was accus- 
tomed to resort to the Capitol before daylight. 

By the Capitol, here, you are to understand the magnificent 
temple of Jupiter situated in Rome, on the Tarpeian mount, 
otherwise called Capitoline Hill. The pious Roman Cath- 
olic priest-painter of the Middle Ages, Fra Angelico, always 
prayed before he painted. The saintly quality of his pictures 
corresponds. To Scipio's habit of devotion, that Roman's 
public conduct might have strictly corresponded, and yet 



70 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

have been decidedly rather Roman than moral. Jupiter be- 
longed to an Olympus of 

Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust, 
Whose attributes were rage, revenge, or lust — 

a couplet, by the way, well deserving to have place, as it has 
not, in the repertories of familiar poetical quotation. It be- 
longs to Pope, occurring in his Essay on Man. 

Metellus Pius (of the same great Roman family, in a later 
generation of it, with the Quintus Metellus to be spoken of 
presently, when Sallust is taken up) emulated the Spartan 
frugality and density of expression : 

While he was carrying on war in Spain, being asked what he was 
going to do the next day, replied, " My tunic, if that were able to tell, 
I should burn." 

The inquiring friend in the case, if he was at all bright, 
must have gathered from this that Metellus did not think 
it good generalship to divulge, on any chance challenge, his 
military plans. 

Then there is that fine humanity of the Emperor Titus. 
Here is the way in which it is affectionately told : 

Titus was called the love and the delight of human kind. Recalling 
once at supper that he had rendered no service to any one during the 
entire day, he uttered that memorable and justly-lauded expression, 
" My friends, I have lost a day ! " 

How almost Christian-like it seems ! What a pity that 
we have to comment it by the acts of Titus's life! Such a 
sentiment, on the lips of the imperial author, must receive 
from you an interpretation not exactly Christian according 
to the Christianity of one of Titus's contemporaries, the 
apostle Paul — when you remember that it was Titus who 
destroyed Jerusalem, and massacred its millions of inhabit- 
ants, men, women, and children together — that it was Titus 



The Latin Reader. 71 



who, to dedicate the Colosseum, (finished by him,) and, in 
connection with that, his magnificent baths, gave gladiatorial 
shows lasting a hundred days, in the course of which, it is 
mentioned, besides the uncounted human beings that slew 
and were slain, five thousand wild beasts were set fighting in 
the arena on a single occasion. Every day of those hun- 
dred, Titus had done a highly valued favor to a great many 
people. Not less than eighty thousand spectators daily wit- 
nessed his bloody exhibitions. Not on any evening of this 
crowded interval, at least, could it have been, that the gentle 
emperor heaved his sentimental sigh over having lost a day! 
Still, it was a fine sentiment, and really Titus was, as Roman 
emperors went, a very humane gentleman. The standards 
by which men judge, nay, the very spirit itself within men 
that judges, have changed since Titus. There have suc- 
ceeded nineteen centuries of Christianity. 

Cicero was a famous wit, as well as a famous orator. But 
wit has to be of a most inextinguishable quality to bear trans- 
lation from one language to another, especially, perhaps, to 
bear translation from one civilization, or mode of life and 
thought, to another. Try here a specimen of Cicero's mem- 
orable witticisms : 

To Dolabella, remarking that he [Dolabella] was thirty years of age, 
Cicero said, " True, for I have been hearing that now these twenty 
years past." 

There is another version of this anecdote. That other 
version leaves Dolabella quite out of the case, and for him 
substitutes a lady, though it gallantly omits to mention the 
lady's name. Anecdotes in those times, like anecdotes in 
these times, seem to have had a trick of getting themselves 
foisted upon various persons, and fitted to different occasions, 
according to the chance, or the whim, or the purpose, of the 
narrator. 

On Cicero's jest, as the jest was given according to the 



72 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

first version of the story, our readers are entitled to have 
what light may be thrown by the fact that Dolabella was a 
celebrated profligate, who became Cicero's son-in-law. Per- 
haps the fellow had long been a well-known man about town, 
who now, as suitor to Cicero's daughter, was, for the twen- 
tieth time, playing himself off for much younger than he was. 
Our readers will probably agree that it is, in this case, the 
fame of the joker which makes the fame of the joke. They 
will also not fail to observe that what point the saying pos- 
sesses, lies in the sarcasm of it. The Roman genius, of itself, 
knew how to be sarcastic. Not even Greek tuition could 
teach it how to be innocently and archly playful. 

Here, however, are some pleasantries of Cicero's that come 
pretty near that mark : 

When he had seen Lentulus, his son, a person of slight stature, girded 
with a long sword, " Who," said he, "has been hitching my son to a 
sword ? " 

Once more : 

Caesar — his colleague in the consulship having died on the last day 
of December — had, at the seventh hour, announced Caninius as consul 
for the rest of the day. As, according to custom, a number of persons 
were going to salute him, "Let us hasten," said Cicero, "before he gets 
out of his magistracy." Concerning the same Caninius, Cicero wrote, 
"A man of wonderful vigilance was Caninius, for during the whole of 
his consulship, he never saw sleep." 

Now take the following word of the Emperor Tiberius : 

Tiberius, to ambassadors from Troas tendering him, a little tardily, 
condolences on the death of his son Drusus, mockingly responded that 
he also commiserated them in turn on the loss of their illustrious fellow- 
citizen, Hector. 

One almost detects in this turn of Tiberius the unconscious 
original of that recent American humor about dropping a tear 
at the grave of Adam. But it was not pleasantry — however 
ill-timed, unfatherly, and unimperial — it was sarcasm, wet with 



The Latin Reader. 



73 



gall, that flavored the reply of gloomy Emperor Tiberius. His 
son Drusus had been poisoned by the emperor's favorite and 
familiar, Se-ja'nus. Was it the earlier and better Tiberius 
— let us trust so — that spoke sincerely in the following ? 

Tiberius, to some provincial governors, urging that their provinces 
should be loaded down with taxes, wrote back, "It is the part of a good 
shepherd to shear his flock, not to skin them." 

Let the specimens thus already presented of the anecdotal 
store contained in the average Latin Reader suffice our pres- 
ent purpose. There is usually included, as we have said, a 
collection of mythological fragments. The Roman genius, 
as it was in nothing else more original, so in nothing else was 
it more fruitful, than in the production of myths and legends 
connected with the national history. Livy, however, whom 
we shall treat in the next Latin volume of this series, deals 
so fully in the national Roman myths, that we may wait to 
reach him before entering upon the topic thus suggested, 
further than to make place for the legend of Romulus and 
Remus ■, 

The vestal virgin Rhea had twin sons, Romulus and Remus, by Mars 
[the god of war.] Now when A-mu'li-us [the king] learned this, he threw 
the mother into chains, while the boys he ordered to be cast into the 
Tiber. It happened that the water of the Tiber had overflowed its 
bank, and, as the lads had been deposited in a shallow place, the water 
subsiding left them on dry land. To their crying a she-wolf came, and 
nursed them from her dugs. Which seeing, one Faus'tu-lus, a shepherd 
of that part, took up the boys, and gave them to his wife, Acca Lau-ren'tia, 
to be nourished. 

There still exists in Rome a bronze statue of the she-wolf 
that suckled the legendary twins. This statue Byron apos- 
trophizes in the fourth canto of the" Childe Harold," with an 
allusion to the fact that it was once struck by lightning : 
And thou, the thunder-stricken nurse of Rome ! 

Pictures are not uncommon of this famous antique statue. 
For these legends, Livy, as we have hinted, is our chief 



74 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

authority. He, however, reports them, not as if he believed 
them himself, and not as if he expected to get them believed 
by others, but as if he would go back in his history to the 
farthest point to which even the wildest stories in the mouths 
of the people could carry him. In whatever way this myth 
of Romulus and Remus was originally made up, there is a 
singular poetic fitness in it to the character and career of the 
great warlike and savage nation of which Romulus was the 
legendary founder. This poetic fitness is still further seen 
in the rest of the myth : 

Thus Romulus and Remus passed their boyhood among shepherds. 
When they had grown to age, and by chance had learned who had 
been their grandfather and who their mother, they slew Amulius, 
and restored the kingdom to their grandfather Nu'mi-tbr. They then 
built on Mount Aventine a city which Romulus, from his own name, 
called Rome. While this was being surrounded with walls, Remus was 
killed in the act of mocking his brother by leaping over the walls. 

It is certainly the fact, that during the earliest, most vigor- 
ous, most virtuous, and every way best, period of Roman his- 
tory, the nation was composed of farmers, who now tilled 
their own land, and now fought their own battles. The boy- 
hood of the nation was, like the boyhood of its founder, 
passed in rustic simplicity. 

Romulus, that he might increase the number of citizens, opened a 
kind of asylum, to which many, driven from their own states, made their 
resort. But to the citizens of the new city there were wanting wives. 
He accordingly instituted a festival of Neptune, together with games. 
When to these many out of the neighboring peoples had come, with 
women and children, the Romans in the midst of the games violently 
bore oft the virgins who were witnessing the spectacles. . . . 

After the death of Romulus, there was a year's interregnum. At the 
end of this time, Nu'ma Pom-pil'i-us, born in Cu'res, a city in the ter- 
ritory of the Sabines, was made king. This great man waged, indeed, 
no war, but he was not for that less useful to the state. For he both 
gave laws and instituted many religious rites which tended to soften the 
manners of a savage and warlike people. All, however, that he did he 



The Latin Reader. 75 



used to assert that be did at the instance of the nymph E-ge'ri-a, his 
spouse. He died of disease in the forty-fourth year of his reign. 

The story of the nymph Egeria has the element of beauty 
and poetry in it. Byron has touched it in his " Childe Harold " 
with some true imaginative feeling and with admirable art : 

Egeria ! sweet creation of some heart 
Which found no mortal resting-place so fair 
As thine ideal breast ; whate'er thou art 
Or wert — a young Aurora of the air, 
The nympholepsy of some fond despair ; 
Or, it might be, a beauty of the earth, 
Who found a more than common votary there 
Too much adoring ; whatsoe'tr thy birth, 
Thou wert a beautiful thought, and softly bodied forth. 

Let those of our readers who love poetry turn to the pas- 
sage in the poem. It there runs on through several stanzas. 
It is finally modulated into one of the most magnificent 
bursts of the Byronic impiety to be found in the whole range 
of the Byronic poetry. Happily and unhappily, this poetic 
impiety in Byron is never anywhere more than half-hearted 
— unhappily, for the quality of the poetry inspired ; happily, 
for the measure of malign influence exerted. To be either 
highest in literary merit, or highest in power of impression, 
literature needs to be intensely real and genuine. Poor 
Byron ! let it always, in mercy to his fame, be remembered 
that he died at thirty-six — too early for the period of " life 
outliving heats of youth." 

Did we almost promise to stop with the one myth of 
Romulus and Remus ? Well, we did not quite promise, you 
know; and how could you, on your part, have spared the 
legend of Egeria, and how could we, on ours, deny ourselves 
the pleasure of giving you that little garnish of poetry about 
the nymph to grace our page withal ? 

Among the late changes in fashion introduced by classical 
teachers is the revived plan of making up Latin Readers 



76 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

that consist exclusively of selections credited to standard 
Latin authors. As we write here, we have before us two 
such collections, one edited by Professor Harkness, under 
the title, " Course in Caesar, Sallust, and Cicero," the other 
edited by Professor W. F. Allen, under the title, "Latin 
Reader." These are both of them admirable compilations. 
Both are furnished with explanatory notes and with vocabu- 
laries. Professor Harkness's book has in addition a number 
of interesting illustrations. Professor Allen's volume repre- 
sents eleven Latin authors, against four represented in the 
larger volume of Professor Harkness. The extracts are of 
course correspondingly shorter in the smaller volume. 

We avail ourselves of the justification offered by compila- 
tions such as these, to include in the present chapter some 
notice, accompanied with some exemplification, of two Latin 
authors for whom otherwise we should find no room in the 
volumes of this series, and who are too important and too 
entertaining not to be brought to the knowledge of our read- 
ers. We refer to Sallust and Ovid. These writers are 
sometimes wholly omitted in the course of Latin literature 
accomplished by the college graduate. Sometimes, again, 
they replace two other writers that are more commonly 
studied — Sallust, in such cases, being made a substitute for 
Caesar, and Ovid for Virgil. * 

We bid our readers, then, observe that in thus adding 
Sallust and Ovid to our list of Roman authors here repre- 
sented, we make our preparatory Latin course in English 
wider and more varied than, in the case of most college 
graduates, was their preparatory Latin course pursued in the 
original language. Ordinarily, as we have hinted, Sallust 
and Ovid are made alternative to Caesar and Virgil. We 
include here all four authors. 

(Readers desiring to know as explicitly as possible what 
tests are .actually applied in examining candidates for matric- 
ulation at college may satisfy their curiosity by consulting 



The Lati?i Reader. 77 



one or the other of two little volumes published by Ginn, 
Heath, & Co., under the titles, respectively, of "Yale Exami- 
nation Papers" and "Harvard Examination Papers." In 
these are reprinted the papers really used in recent years 
for entrance examinations at the two institutions named. Of 
course changes are made in the examination papers from 
year to year.) 

Sallust. 

Sallust wrote three historical works, the " Conspiracy of Cat- 
iline," the " Jugurthine War," and a " History of Rome from 
the Death of Sulla [Sylla] to the Mithridatic War." This last, 
the most important of the three, has, with the exception of a 
few fragments, perished. The other two, historical mono- 
graphs — or even politico-historical pamphlets, we might al- 
most call them — rather than histories, remain to us entire. 
If we should give our readers the " Conspiracy of Catiline," 
that would be anticipating in great part what they will find 
narrated in the specimens of Cicero's oratory to be furnished 
in this volume. We decide, therefore, to let Sallust appear 
in his "Jugurthine War." This will bring the celebrated 
Caius Marius before us, as delineated by one of the great an- 
cient masters of historical composition. And Jugurtha him- 
self is a striking and commanding figure, set in temporary 
lurid relief against the threatened, but finally victorious, 
greatness of Pvome. 

Caius, or to adopt the latest vogue in Latin scholarship, 
Gaius, orGajus — Sallustius Crispus, more familiar as simply 
Sallust, the historian, was born 86 B. C. We know little of 
the beginning of his life. He became senator early enough 
to be, ostensibly for his profligate manners, expelled from 
the senate when he was thirty-six years old. He got his 
seat again three years afterward. He was lucky enough to 
choose his side with Ctesar in the civil war, and for this was 
made governor of Numidia. His Numidian experience, per- 
haps, qualified him the better to treat the subject of his 



78 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



" Jugurthine War." It at least gave him the opportunity to 
amass immense riches, with which to retire from public life 
and devote himself to literature. He died, however, at the 
comparatively early age of fifty-two. The residence he 
occupied in Rome was in the midst o'f grounds laid out and 
beautified by him with the most lavish magnificence. These 
grounds became subsequently the chosen resort of the 
Roman emperors. They still bear the name of the Gardens 
of Sallust. . Sallust moralized with much virtue in his histo- 
ries, but his actual life was said to be deformed with nearly 
every vice and excess. 

The " Jugurthine War " is commenced with a sort of moral 
essay, or homily, not having the least particular relation to 
the subject about to be treated. Our readers must see in 
specimen this absurdly placed bit of didactics. It will throw 
for them a light of illustration on the character of the man 
who could with grave face inappropriately obtrude in a 
history a preface of sentiments so violently out of accord 
with his own notorious practice. We use the translation, a 
very good one, printed in Bonn's Classical Library: 

Mankind unreasonably complain of their nature, that, being weak 
and short-lived, it is governed by chance rather than intellectual power ; 
for, on the contrary, you will find, upon reflection, that there is nothing 
more noble or excellent, and that to nature is wanting rather human 
industry than ability or lime. . . . 

The depravity of those, therefore, is the more surprising, who, devoted 
to corporeal gratifications, spend their lives in luxury and indolence, but 
suffer the mind, than which nothing is better or greater in man, to lan- 
guish in neglect and inactivity ; especially when there are so many and 
various mental employments by which the highest renown may be 
attained. 

There, that will do, surely. The disease of unreality which, 
with the extinguishment of liberty under the emperors, 
was so soon to attack Roman literature and make it com- 
paratively worthless, had already, in such writing as this of 
Sallust's, begun to exhibit its premonitory symptoms. Sallust 



The Latin Reader. 79 



is tolerably genuine when he stops moralizing and com- 
mences narrating. Still, he is to be classed with the romantic, 
rather than the realistic, with the rhetorical, rather than 
the philosophical, historians. Our readers, when they come 
to study Caesar's writings, will feel the marked difference of 
tone between the two. 
Sallust : 

I am about to relate the war which the Roman people carried on with 
Jugurtha, King of the Numidians :♦ first, because it was great, sanguinary, 
and of varied fortune; and secondly, because then, for the first time, 
opposition was offered to the power of the nobility ; a contest which 
threw every thing, religious and civil, into confusion, and was carried to 
such a height of madness, that nothing but war, and the devastation of 
Italy, could put an end to civil dissensions. But before I fairly com- 
mence my narrative, I will take a review of a few preceding particulars, 
in order that the whole subject may be more clearly and distinctly un- 
derstood. 

Sallust's preliminary historical review recounts how. dur- 
ing the second Punic war, (of course before Jugurtha's time,) 
the king of the Numidians had rendered invaluable aid to 
the Romans, and been by them rewarded with important 
accessions to his kingdom. The kingdom of Numidia re- 
mained a faithful ally to Rome throughout that reign. The 
succeeding king, Mi-cip'sa, had two sons, and an orphan 
nephew whom he brought up with his two sons, in the same 
nurture. This nephew was Jugurtha. Sallust portrays the 
youthful person and character of Jugurtha in a few bold 
strokes, as follows: 

Jugurtha, as he grew up, being strong in frame, graceful in person, 
but, above all, vigorous in understanding, did not allow himseif to be 
enervated by pleasure and indolence, but, as is the usage of his country, 
exercised himself in riding, throwing the javelin, and contending in the 
race with his equals in age ; and, though he excelled them all in reputa- 
tion, he was yet beloved by all. He also passed much of his time in 
hunting ; he was first, or among the first, to wound the lion and other 
beasts ; he performed very much, but spoke very little of himself. 



So Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Jugurtha was quite too promising a young fellow to leave 
his patronizing uncle, the king, at ease in his own mind. 
Micipsa formed a sinister plan to make away with so dan- 
gerous a competitor for succession to the crown. This plan 
Sallust sketches in the following words: 

He resolved, as Jugurtha was of an active disposition and eager for 
military reputation, to expose him to dangers in the field, and thus make 
trial of fortune. During the Numantine war, therefore, when lie was 
sending supplies of horse and foot to the Romans, he gave him the com- 
mand of the Numidians whom he despatched into Spain, hoping that he 
would certainly perish, either by an ostentatious display of his bravery, 
or by the merciless hand of the enemy. 

The result was sadly disappointing. Jugurtha not merely 
survived his dangers, but he made himself famous. The 
king, with great good sense, adjusted himself to circum- 
stances which he could not control, and adopted the youth 
as his son. 

A few years after, the aged Micipsa, about to die, makes 
a death-bed address, full of affectionate wisdom, to his sons 
and his nephew. Sallust reproduces it for us at length, 
much as if there had been a short-hand reporter present to 
take down word after word falling from the old man's lips. 
This is Sallust's fashion in historical composition. He herein 
imitates his master Thucydides. Our readers shall, in due 
time, have a specimen of the speeches that Sallust constructs 
for the persons of his drama. But we will skip the dying 
Micipsa's farewell address, in favor of an harangue, to come 
later, from no less a character than Caius Marius himself. 

To his uncle's exhortations, Jugurtha, all the while secretly 
feeling that they were insincerely spoken, schools himself to 
make a dutiful reply. In a few days, Micipsa dies. The 
real state of feeling among the king's three heirs was prompt 
in declaring itself. They quarreled, and Jugurtha got his 
kinsman, Hi-emp'sal, treacherously killed. 

The surviving brother, Ad-her'bal, defeated in a battle joined 



The Latin Reader. 81 



by him with Jugurtha in defense of his right, fled a suppliant 
to Rome. Sallust gives us the really eloquent and pathetic, 
if rather elaborate, speech in which he pleaded before the 
Roman senate. But Jugurtha pleaded with money, instead 
of with eloquence and pathos, and the Roman senate ad- 
judged Jugurtha the better orator of the two. It is a shame- 
ful story, as Sallust, probably with substantial truth, relates it. 
Sallust, to be sure, writes as a thorough-going partisan of 
Csesar, by espousing whose cause he had come to the enjoy- 
ment of his present enormous ill-gotten wealth. Now Csesar 
was one party, and the Roman senate another. Whatever, 
therefore, tended to exhibit the unworthiness of the senate 
tended, so far, to justify Csesar's usurpation of power. But 
the senate was, it must, no doubt, be confessed, an oligarchy 
grown, already in Jugurtha's time, incredibly corrupt. Sub- 
sequently somewhat revived in virtue, it suffered however a 
relapse worse than the original disease. Csesar, unquestion- 
ably, found a senate invested with no moral right, subsist- 
ing in the character of its members, to administer the gov- 
ernment of the world. 

There follows now, in Sallust's text, a little digression on 
the geography of Africa in general, which it will do for us 
wholly to omit. It is not usual to see editions of Sallust's 
"Jugurthine War" illustrated with a map of the regions con- 
cerned. In truth, there is some degree of geographical, as 
well as chronological, vagueness in Sallust's history which, 
perhaps, may not unfairly be taken to mark the less strictly 
verifiable historical character of the work, in comparison 
with Csesar's Commentaries, for instance. 

The kingdom of Numidia was, by interference from Rome, 
divided between the two claimants, Jugurtha getting the lion's 
share. Jugurtha was now convinced that he could buy 
whatever he wanted at Rome. He proceeded, accordingly, 
with a high hand, to encroach on the rights of his brother 
Adherbal. The two fought, and Adherbal was worsted. 
4* 



82 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Jugurtha has no difficulty in ridding himself of three young 
Romans sent to him and to Adherbal, as ambassadors from 
the mistress of nations, to enjoin concord between the two 
contending kinsmen. These outwitted deputies get no 
chance whatever at the ear of Adherbal. Jugurtha professes 
profound respect for the authority of the Roman senate, 
promises to send soon to Rome an embassy who shall ex- 
plain his conduct satisfactorily, and so speeds the youthful 
diplomatists home, carrying with them barren fair words 
from the wily usurper, as the sole fruit of their mission to 
Africa. These ambassadors were no sooner well out of the 
country, than Jugurtha besieged Adherbal in Cirta with the 
utmost energy. Adherbal found means to send by messen- 
gers an urgent appeal to Rome, which, however, Jugurtha's 
partisans in the city took care should bring about no more 
serious result than the dispatch of a fresh embassy to Africa. 

This time it is a deputation extremely reverend by age, by 
birth, by political influence, in the persons composing it. 
Arrived at Utica, (the African town subsequently to be made 
so memorable by the tragic suicide of Cato, refusing to sur- 
vive the republic,) these men of dignity summon Jugurtha 
by letter to meet them there. Instead of promptly obeying 
this august behest, Jugurtha redoubled his efforts to capture 
Cirta. Not succeeding, he took counsel of his prudence, 
and, though without raising the siege, went tardily to meet 
the Roman ambassadors. These upbraided his contumacy, 
threatened him gravely in the name of the senate, but retired 
without finally getting Jugurtha to yield. In this state of 
things Adherbal, overpowered by the persuasions of others, 
made a reluctant surrender to Jugurtha. Jugurtha put Ad- 
herbal to death with torture, and massacred indiscriminately 
all the grown-up inhabitants of the town. 

This audacious proceeding on Jugurtha's part raised a 
storm of indignation at Rome, which, however, under the 
pacifying influence of the Numidian conqueror's money, 



The Latin Reader. 83 



seemed likely to be laid, till, as Sallust represents it, an elo- 
quent and energetic tribune of the people, rousing the public 
to perceive the perfidious venality of the senate, compelled 
that body to move in a serious demonstration against the 
designs of Jugurtha. Cal pur'ni-us, one of the consuls next 
elected, was sent with an army into Africa. With him went 
Scaurus, described as an astute, but corrupt, politician of 
great influence at Rome. 

Calpurnius made a spirited beginning of war, but Jugurtha 
met him with weapons of silver and gold that Calpurnius 
could not resist. Scaurus, too, was bought with a great sum 
of money. The issue was that, Jugurtha having been per- 
mitted to make a merely nominal surrender, the consul went 
back to Rome and left Numidia at peace. 

But that same tribune of the people, Caius Memmhis by 
name, again excited the people to withstand the shameful 
corruption of the senate and nobles. Sallust takes occasion 
to supply in full one of this enterprising orator's popular 
harangues. It is, of course, Sallust in form and in spirit, 
though it may in substance be Memmius. It is only fair, 
however, to the historian to say that he here, as usual, gives 
his reader the hint not to expect from him word-for-word 
leporting. He introduces the speech of Memmius, not as 
" the following speech," but as " a speech of the following 
kind." 

The eloquence of Memmius had its effect. Lucius Cas- 
sius, a man of stainless fame for probity, was sent to bring 
Jugurtha, under pledge of the public faith for his safety, to 
Rome. The thing aimed at was to get Jugurtha's testimony 
for the conviction of those — Scaurus and the rest — who had 
been guilty of taking bribes. Sallust himself again : 

Jugurtha, accordingly, accompanied Cassius to Rome, but without any 
mark of royalty, and in the garb, as much as possible, of a suppliant; and, 
though he felt great confidence on his own part, and was supported by 
all those through whose power or villainy he had accomplished his 



84 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

projects, he purchased, by a vast bribe, the aid of Caius Boe'bi-us, a trib- 
une of the people, by whose audacity he hoped to be protected against 
the law, and against all harm. 

Advised by Bsebius, Jugurtha faced the angry assembly 
of the Roman people, and triumphantly refused to testify 
against those who had been bribed by him. 

There was at this time in Rome a Numidian refugee, of 
blood nearly enough royal to give him some color of claim to 
the throne of the kingdom. Mas-si'va was his name, and 
this Massiva was by one of the consuls for that year pur- 
suaded to petition the senate for the Numidian crown. Al- 
bi'nus, the instigating consul, was a restless spirit who wished 
to enjoy the chance of distinguishing himself in a war. 

The result was fatal to the Numidian aspirant. Resource- 
ful and unscrupulous Jugurtha procured his assassination. 
Soon after, having first sent off the assassin in safety, not- 
withstanding that he had given fifty of his own friends in 
bail for that criminal's appearance, he withdrew himself from 
Rome, saying as he looked back at the place, " A venal city, 
could it but find a purchaser! " What became of Jugur- 
tha's fifty sureties for his friend the assassin, Sallust does 
not inform us ! 

The war was renewed, but Jugurtha avoided decisive en- 
gagements, and, full of shifts, protracted the campaign until 
people began to say, " Albinus, too, is a traitor." Faith in 
public virtue was almost extinct. 

Albinus finally went home, leaving his brother Aulus to 
act in his place. Aulus was seized with the desire to do a 
conspicuous stroke of business. In midwinter, he went to 
the town in which Jugurtha's treasures were deposited, and 
absurdly attempted to take it by siege. Jugurtha, playing 
with this Roman's vanity and weakness, soon had him com- 
pletely in his power. The end was that a Roman army was 
reduced to the disgrace of passing under the yoke. The 
condition of their being permitted to escape alive and free, 



The Latin Reader 



was that they should quit Numidia within ten days. On 
such hard terms, they were admitted to treaty with the con- 
queror. 

Now is illustrated the unscrupulous policy of Rome. 
Albinus consulted the senate on the subject of the treaty. 
The senate (" as was just," Sallust calmly remarks) decreed 
that " no treaty could be made without their own consent 
and that of the people." In other words, apparently, Rome 
accepted the advantage and repudiated the price at which 
the advantage was bought. 

Sallust at this point enters into a striking and instructive 
exposition of the state of parties at Rome. This we must 
leave, and leap forward to the story of the campaign against 
Jugurtha conducted by Metellus. Metellus was, according 
to Sallust, a man of talent and character. He restored the 
discipline of the Roman army, and made such head against 
Jugurtha that this prince was fain, or at least feigned to be 
fain, to make a surrender. But the Roman was now willing 
to try a match in duplicity with the Numidian. Let Sallust 
himself report a few moves in this extraordinary game at 
mutual deceit — a game, we are bound to say, in which all the 
really unquestionable deceit is on the Roman's side : 

Jugurtha sent deputies to the consul with proposals of submission, 
stipulating only for his own life and that of his children, and offering to 
surrender every thing else to the Romans. But Metellus had already 
learned by experience that the Numidians were a faithless race, of un- 
settled disposition, and fond of change; and lie accordingly applied 
himself to each of the deputies separately, and after gradually sounding 
them, and finding them proper instruments for his purpose, prevailed 
on them, by large promises, to deliver Jugurtha into his hands ; bring- 
ing him alive, if they could, or dead, if to take him alive should be im- 
practicable. In public, however, he directed that such an answer 
should be given to the king as would be agreeable to his wishes. 

A few days afterward, he led the army, which was now vigorous 
and resolute, into Numidia, where, instead of any appearance of war, 
he found the cottages full of people, and the cattle and laborers in the 
fields, while the officers of Jugurtha came from the towns and villages to 



86 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

meet him, offering to supply him with corn, to convey provisions for 
him, and to do whatever might be required of them. Metellus, not- 
withstanding, made no diminution in the caution with which he marched, 
but kept as much on the defensive as if an enemy had been at hand ; 
and he dispatched scouts to explore the country, thinking that these signs 
of submission were but pretense, and that the Numidians were watching 
an opportunity for treachery. . . . Such was the subtlety of Jugurtha, and 
such his knowledge of the country and the art of war, that it was doubt- 
ful whether he was more formidable absent or present, offering peace or 
threatening hostilities. . . . 

In the midst of these proceedings, Jugurtha, with extraordinary ear- 
nestness, sent deputies to sue for peace, offering to resign every thing to 
Metellus, except his own Life and that of his children. These, like the 
former, the consul first seduced to treachery, and then sent back ; the 
peace which Jugurtha asked, he neither granted nor refused, but waited, 
during these delays, the performance of the deputies' promises. 

Jugurtha, on comparing the words of Metellus with his actions, per- 
ceived that he was assailed with his own artifices ; for though peace was 
offered him in words, a most vigorous war was in reality pursued against 
him ; one of his strongest cities was wrested from him ; his country was 
explored by the enemy, and the affections of his subjects alienated. Be- 
ing compelled, therefore, by the necessity of circumstances, he resolved 
to try the fortune of a battle. 

The incidents of the battle finally joined between the two 
armies, and of the siege that followed, of the town of Zama, 
are highly interesting. It is a pity that the limits of our 
space forbid our giving them at large in Sallust's own words. 
The fortune of war wavers in exciting vicissitudes, but on 
the whole inclines in favor of the Romans. The fame of 
Metellus rises high at Rome. Caius Marius, as a lieutenant 
of the general, becomes a conspicuous figure in the story. 
He will presently as consul succeed to the chief command 
against Jugurtha. 

The siege of Zama, Metellus had to raise. The period of 
military inaction enforced by the winter season, this Roman 
general (praised, though a senatorial aristocrat, by Sallust, 
as being a man of honor) "did not," so the rigid historian, 
mindful of his moral, remarks, " like other commanders, 



The Latin Reader. 87 



abandon to idleness and luxury." But the account of high- 
minded Metellus's winter activity in war must be set before 
our readers in the translated text of the original writer him- 
self. Sallust says : 

Metellus, as the war had been but slowly advanced by fighting, re- 
solved to try the effect of treachery on the king through his friends, 
and to employ their perfidy instead of arms. He accordingly ad- 
dressed himself, with large promises, to Bo-mil'car, the same noble- 
man who had been with Jugurtha at Rome, and who had fled from 
thence, notwithstanding he had given bail, to escape being tried 
for the murder of Massiva ; selecting this person for his instrument, be- 
cause, from his great intimacy with Jugurtha, he had the best opportu- 
nities of betraying him. He prevailed on him, in the first place, to 
come to a conference with him privately, when, having given him his 
word, " that, if he should deliver up Jugurtha, alive or dead, the senate 
would grant him a pardon, and the full possession of his property," he 
easily brought him over to his purpose, especially as he was naturally 
faithless, and also apprehensive that, if peace were made with the Ro- 
mans, he himself would be surrendered to justice by the terms of it. 

Bomilcar took advantage of a time when Jugurtha was in 
low spirits and got him to offer a surrender. Metellus re- 
quired of him to give up 200,000 pounds' weight of silver, 
w r ith his elephants and a portion of his hors*es and arms. 
This done, all the deserters then were demanded, to be 
brought in chains. The next thing exacted was that Ju- 
gurtha should surrender his own person. 

The war with Jugurtha was, however, still not ended. 
But before resuming the narrative of warlike operations, 
Sallust, with a few graphic and powerful strokes, paints Caius 
Marius into his canvas : 

About the same time, as Caius Marius, who happened to be at Utica, 
was sacrificing to the gods, an augur told him that great and wonderful 
things were presaged to him ; that he might therefore pursue whatever 
designs he had formed, trusting to the gods for success ; and that he 
might try fortune as often as he pleased, for that all his undertakings 
would prosper. Previously to this period, an ardent longing for the 
consulship had possessed him ; and he had, indeed, every qualification 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



for obtaining it, except antiquity of family; he had industry, integrity, 
great knowledge of war, and a spirit undaunted in the field ; he was 
temperate in private life, superior to pleasure and riches, and ambitious 
only of glory. Having been born at Ar-pi'num, and brought up there dur- 
ing his boyhood, he employed himself, as soon as he was of age to bear 
arms, not in the study of Greek eloquence, nor in learning the refinements 
of the city, but in military service ; and thus, amid the strictest discipline, 
his excellent genius soon attained full vigor. When he solicited the 
people, therefore, for the military tribuneship, he was well known by 
name, though most were strangers to his face, and unanimously elected 
by the tribes. After this office he attained others in succession, and 
conducted himself so well in his public duties that he was always 
deemed worthy of a higher station than he had reached. Vet, though 
such had been his character hitherto, (for he was afterward carried away 
by ambition,) he had not ventured to stand for the consulship. The 
people, at that time, still disposed of other civil offices, but the 
nobility transmitted the consulship from hand to hand among them- 
selves. Nor had any commoner appeared, however famous or distin- 
guished by his achievements, who would not have been thought un- 
worthy of that honor, and, as it were, a disgrace to it. 

The people of Vacca, a town which Metellus had garri- 
soned, Jugurtha succeeded in inducing to return to their 
allegiance to himself. The Vaccans, through base treachery, 
put the Roman garrison to death. Two days after, Metellus 
arrived before the town. The inhabitants, seeing his van- 
guard of Numidian cavalry, said, "It is Jugurtha," and went 
out joyfully to meet their king. The wretched city, de- 
scribed as great and opulent, was given over to pillage. The 
only Roman that, in the massacre of ten days before, had 
escaped the violence of the Numidians, was put on his trial 
by Metellus. This was Tur-pil'i-us, the commander of the 
garrison. Not answering satisfactorily how it chanced that 
he himself survived alone, the unhappy man was scourged 
and executed. Such was Roman discipline. 

There was plot, and there was plot within plot. Bomilcar 
had seduced Jugurtha's trusted friend, Nab-dal'sa, to join 
him in his designs against their common master. Nabdalsa 



The Latin Reader. 



had an attack of misgiving. Bomilcar sent him a tonic let- 
ter. This letter the recipient left on his pillow, as he sank 
into a sleep of exhaustion. His trusted friend found the 
letter, and made all haste to carry it to Jugurtha. Jugur- 
tha put Bomilcar with others to death The Numidian 
prince's state of mind and way of life, resulting, are power- 
fully described by Sallust : 

After this occurrence he had no peace either by day or by night ; he 
thought himself safe neither in any place, nor with any person, nor at 
any time ; he feared his subjects and his enemies alike ; he was always 
on the watch, and was startled at every sound ; he passed the night 
sometimes in one place, and sometimes in another, and often in places 
little suited to royal dignity ; and sometimes, starting from his sleep, he 
would seize his arms, and raise an alarm. He was, indeed, so agitated 
by extreme terror that he appeared under the influence of madness. 

Metellus now renews with zeal the prosecution of the war, 
and Jugurtha is driven to extremity. Marius is excused to 
go to Rome and stand for the consulship. He is elected. 
Meantime, however, Metellus, having defeated Jugurtha in a 
battle, follows his, retreating foe across a desert fifty miles 
wide, to a city which he finally invests and takes. But the prize 
of war, irrepressible Jugurtha himself, has escaped, carrying 
with him a large part of his treasure. The town is found by 
its captors to be an empty mass of ruin. It had been de- 
fended by Romans — Roman deserters to Jugurtha. These 
men could hope for no mercy from their conquerors. Sallust 
thus tells how they perished ; it is a frightful tale, but the 
historian wastes no sentiment in telling it : 

When they [the Roman deserters defending the town] saw the walls 
shaken by the battering-ram, and their own situation desperate, they had 
conveyed the gold and silver, and whatever else is esteemed valuable, to 
the royal palace, where, after being sated with wine and luxuries, they 
destroyed the treasures, the building, and themselves by fire, and thus 
voluntarily submitted to the sufferings which, in case of being conquered, 
they dreaded at the hands of the enemy. 



90 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Jugurtha was inexhaustible of resources. He went now 
to the Ge-tu'li-ans, a savage African tribe, and enlisted recruits 
whom he trained to be soldiers. King Bocchus, too, the 
Mau'ri-ta'ni-an king, was approached by Jugurtha, who finally 
induced this monarch, his own father-in-law, to make com- 
mon cause with himself against Rome. In the midst of prep- 
arations, on his part, to meet these confederates, Metellus 
was advised from Rome that Marius had already been ap- 
pointed his successor in the war. The proud spirit broke at 
this humiliation. Metellus wept. 

Marius, still in Rome, was drunk with natural wild tem- 
perament and with success. He carried every thing before 
him. The haughty senate was at his feet. He spurned 
them in a speech to the people which Sallust constructs for 
him as follows (we abridge) : 

I am aware, my fellow-citizens, that most men do not appear as can- 
didates before you for an office, and conduct themselves in it when they 
have obtained it, under the same character ; that they are at first 
industrious, humble, and modest, but afterward lead a life of indo- 
lence and arrogance. But to me it appears that the contrary should be 
the case. . . . 

If others fail in their undertakings, their ancient rank, the heroic ac- 
tions of their ancestors, the power of their relatives and connections, their 
numerous dependents are all at hand to support them ; but as for me, 
my whole hopes rest upon myself, which I must sustain by good conduct 
and integrity ; for all other means are unavailing. . . . 

You have commanded me to carry on the war against Jugurtha ; a 
commission at which the nobility are highly offended. Consider with 
yourselves, I pray you, whether it would be a change for the better if 
you were to send to this, or to any other such appointment, one of yon- 
der crowd of nobles, a man of ancient family, of innumerable statues, 
and of no military experience. . . . 

Compare now, my fellow-citizens, me, who am a new man, with those 
haughty nobles. What they have but heard or read, I have witnessed or 
performed. What they have learned from books, I have acquired in the 
field ; and whether deeds or words are of greater estimation, it is for 
you to consider. They despise my humbleness of birth ; I contemn their 
imbecilitv. . . . 



The Lati?i Reader. 91 



.My speech, they say, is inelegant ; but that I have ever thought of little 
importance. Worth sufficiently displays itself; it is for my detractors to 
use studied language, that they may palliate base conduct by plausible 
words. Nor have I learned Greek ; for I had no wish to acquire a 
tongue that adds nothing to the valor of those who teach it. But I have 
gained other accomplishments, such as are of the utmost benefit to a 
state : I have learned to strike down an enemy ; to be vigilant at my 
post; to fear nothing but dishonor; to bear cold and heat with equal 
endurance; to sleep on the ground; and to sustain at the same time 
liunger and fatigue. And with such rules of conduct I shall stimulate 
my soldiers, not treating them with rigor and myself with indulgence, 
nor making their toils my glory. Such a mode of commanding is at once 
useful to the state, and becoming to a citizen. For to coerce your troops 
with severity, while you yourself live at ease, is to be a tyrant, not a 
general. . . . 

Such of you, then, as are of military age, co-operate with me, and 
support the cause of your country ; and let no discouragement, from the 
ill-fortune of others, or the arrogance of the late commanders, affect any 
one of you. I myself shall be with you, both on the march and in the 
battle, both to direct your movements and to share your dangers. I 
shall treat you and myself on every occasion alike ; and, doubtless, with 
the aid of the gods, all good things, victory, spoil, and glory, are ready 
to our hands ; though, even if they were doubtful or distant, it would 
still become eveiy able citizen to act in defense of his country. For no 
man, by slothful timidity, has escaped the lot of mortals ; nor has any 
parent wished for his children that they might live forever, but rather 
that they might act in life with virtue and honor. I would add more, 
my fellow-citizens, if words could give courage to the faint-hearted ; to 
the brave I think I have said enough. 

Marius easily raised a great army. Every body was eager 
to be a soldier under the idolized hero of the hour. The 
two confederate kings, Jugurtha and Bocchus, retired differ- 
ent ways before the Roman general. But Marius was not to 
be beguiled. He did not disperse his forces, and he did not 
relax his discipline. He had begun by whetting the appetite 
of his soldiers with maddening tastes of plunder. He cap- 
tured places, and gave up the booty to his men. He w r as 
rapidly making for himself an army after his own heart — as 
fierce as brave, and as greedy as fierce. Soon he aimed at 



Preparatory Lathi Course in English. 



the most difficult, at the apparently impossible. He would 
take Capsa, a city great and strong, surrounded by deserts 
vast in extent, destitute of water, and infested with wild 
beasts and with venomous serpents. Through these waste 
tracts Marius marched his men by night. Three nights they 
thus pressed on. He had provided water-bottles, made from 
the skins of cattle killed on the way for food. These water- 
bottles, filled from the last river, were the only baggage that 
was carried by man or beast. The impossible was achieved. 
Capsa was surprised and taken. The grown-up inhabitants 
were all butchered. 

The rest were sold, and the spoil divided among the soldiers. This 
severity, in violation [as Sallust rather unexpectedly remarks] of the 
usages of war, was not adopted from avarice or cruelty in the consul, but 
was exercised because the place was of great advantage to Jugurtha, and 
difficult of access to us, while the inhabitants were a fickle and faithless 
race, to be influenced neither by kindness nor by terror. 

The effect of such success on the part of Marius was to 
make him almost a god in the eyes of both friends and foes. 
Thenceforward, a fine saying of Virgil's, by him applied to a 
comparatively trivial occasion, will be true in this war for 
Marius. He will be able, for he will seem to be able. The 
next great incident in his campaign furnishes an illustration. 

Marius had undertaken a second well-nigh impossible feat. 
It was not prospering. But again his good fortune befriended 
him. By mere chance, as it seemed, a Li-gu'ri-an soldier dis- 
covered one particular spot at which it was practicable for a 
few bold men to effect an entrance into an otherwise im- 
pregnably defended town of the Numidians, which, to all 
previous appearance vainly, Marius was besieging. The en- 
trance was effected and the town was Marius's. The very 
imprudence of his attempt redounded to his glory — for 
the imprudent attempt was successful. The incident of the 
Ligurian's individual enterprise is a pleasing relief and orna- 
ment embroidered upon the general text of the history. 



The Latin Reader. 93 



Another celebrated character here enters upon the scene 
of Sallust's story, to play a brilliant, though a subordinate, 
part. The player of a second part now, this man is destined 
in the sequel to drive Marius himself off the stage. It is 
no other than Lucius Sylla, the future dictator of Rome. 
Sallust is not reluctant to illustrate his page with a strong 
portrait in . words of this remarkable man. Our readers 
must see the delineation, unchanged except as translated. 
And here it is : 

Sylla, then, was of patrician descent, but of a family almost sunk in 
obscurity by the degeneracy of his forefathers. He was skilled, equally 
and profoundly, in Greek and Roman literature. He was a man of large 
mind, fond of pleasure, but fonder of glory. His leisure was spent in 
luxurious gratifications, but pleasure never kept him from his duties, 
except that he might have acted more for his honor with regard to his 
wife. He was eloquent and subtle, and lived on the easiest terms with 
his friends. His depth of thought in disguising his intentions was in- 
credible. He was liberal of most things, but especially of money. And 
though he was the most fortunate of all men before his victory in the 
civil war, yet his fortune was never beyond his desert ; and many have 
expressed a doubt whether his success or his merit were the greater. As 
to his subsequent acts, I know not whether more of shame or of regret 
must be felt at the recital of them. 

When Sylla came with his cavalry into Africa, as has just been stated, 
and arrived at the camp of Marius, though he had hitherto been un- 
skilled and undisciplined in the art of war, he became, in a short time, 
the most expert of the whole army. He was, besides, affable to the sol- 
diers ; he conferred favors on many at their request, and on others of his 
own accord, and was reluctant to receive any in return. But he repaid 
other obligations more readily than those of a pecuniary nature ; he 
himself demanded repayment from no one, but rather made it his object 
that as many as possible should be indebted to him. He conversed, 
jocosely as well as seriously, with the humblest of the soldiers ; he was 
their frequent companion at their works, on the march, and on guard. 
Nor did he ever, as is usual with depraved ambition, attempt to injure 
the character of the consul, or of any deserving person. His sole aim, 
whether in the council or the field, was to suffer none to excel him ; to 
most he was superior. By such conduct he soon became a favorite both 
with Marius and with the army. 



94 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Marius was marching to winter-quarters, when one day, 
just before dark, the combined armies of the two kings, Ju- 
gurtha and Bocchus, suddenly fell upon him. It was a com- 
plete surprise. What happened illustrates so well the ac- 
count given in a previous chapter, of the discipline and valor 
of Roman legionaries, that we present the narrative in Sal- 
lust's own words, simply making a few silent omissions neces- 
sary for economy of space : 

Before the troops could either form themselves or collect the baggage, 
before they could receive even a signal or an order, the Moorish and 
Getulian horse, not in line, or any regular array of battle, but in separate 
bodies, as chance had united them, rushed furiously on our men ; who, 
though all struck with a panic, yet, calling to mind what they had done 
on former occasions, either seized their arms, or protected those who 
were looking for theirs, while some, springing on their horses, advanced 
against the enemy. But the whole conflict was more like a rencounter 
with robbers than a battle ; the horse and foot of the enemy, mingled 
together without standards or order, wounded some of our men, and cut 
down others, and surprised many in the rear while fighting stoutly with 
those in front ; neither valor nor arms were a sufficient defense, the en- 
emy being superior in numbers, and covering the field on all sides. At 
last the Roman veterans, who were necessarily well experienced in war, 
formed themselves, wherever the nature of the ground or chance allowed 
them to unite, in circular bodies, and thus secured on every side, and 
regularly drawn up, withstood the attacks of the enemy. 

Marius, in this desperate emergency, was not more alarmed or dis- 
heartened than on any previous occasion, but rode about with his troop 
of cavalry, which he had formed of his bravest soldiers rather than his 
nearest friends, in every quarter of the field, sometimes supporting his 
own men when giving way, sometimes charging the enemy where they 
were thickest, and doing service to his troops with his sword, since, in 
the general confusion, he was unable to command with his voice. 

The day had now closed. . . . Marius, that his men might have a place 
of retreat, took possession of two hills contiguous to each other. . . . The 
kings, obliged by the strength of the Roman position, were deterred 
from continuing the combat. . . . Having then lighted numerous fires, 
the barbarians, after their custom, spent most of the night in merri- 
ment exultation, and tumultuous clamor, the kings, elated at having kept 
their ground, conducting themselves as conquerors. This scene, plainly 



The Latin Reader. 95 



visible to the Romans, under cover of the night and on the higher 
ground, afforded great encouragement to them. 

Marius kept his army perfectly still, let the poor Africans 
have their riot out, let them sink into exhausted sleep, and 
then, falling upon them at day-break, slaughtered them as 
if they had been sheep. 

Marius now again takes up his march to winter-quarters. 
As a last particular mentioned of the order of march ob- 
served, Sallust, in characteristically Roman spirit, remarks: 
" The deserters, [that is, the Numidians who had de- 
serted to the Romans,] whose lives were of little value, and 
who were well acquainted with the country, kept watch of 
the route of the enemy." A few touches added now to the 
portrait of Marius are as full of the artist's power as they are 
of the subject's character: 

Marius himself, too, as if no other were placed in charge, attended 
to every thing, went through the whole of the troops, and praised or 
blamed them according to their desert. He was always armed and on 
the alert, and obliged his men to imitate his example. He fortified 
his camp with the same caution with which he marched ; stationing 
cohorts of the legions to watch the gates, and the auxiliary cavalry in 
front, and others upon the rampart and lines. He went round the 
posts in person, not from suspicion that his orders would not be ob- 
served, but that the labor of the soldiers, shared equally by their gen- 
eral, might be endured by them with cheerfulness. Indeed, Marius, as 
well at this as at other periods of the war, kept his men to their 
duty rather by the dread of shame than of severity; a course which 
many said was adopted from a desire of popularity, but some thought 
it was because he took pleasure in toils to which he had been accus- 
tomed from his youth, and in exertions which other men call perfect 
miseries. The public interest, however, was served with as much 
efficiency and honor as it could have been under the most rigorous 
command. 

The caution of Marius was wise. On the fourth day fol- 
lowing, the indefatigable, the unconquerable spirit of Jugur- 
tha brought him again to the attack. He almost won the 



g6 Prepay atoj-y Lati/i Course in English. 

day, but once more those invincible Romans snatched vic- 
tory out of the very jaws of defeat. The battle-field, as it 
appeared at this moment, is described by Sallust in a cele- 
brated sentence, which a note by the English translator of 
his text enables us conveniently to compare with two cele- 
brated parallels, one earlier and one later, in literary history 
than Sallust. The first is Sallust's own original in Xeno- 
phon, the second is a copy in Tacitus taken probably from 
this copy by Sallust. Sallust says : 

The spectacle on the open plains was then frightful ; some were pur- 
suing, others fleeing ; some were being slain, others captured ; men and 
horses were dashed to the earth ; many, who were wounded, could 
neither flee nor remain at rest, attempting to rise, and instantly falling 
back ; and the whole field, as far as the eye could reach, was strewed 
with arms and dead bodies, and the intermediate spaces saturated with 
blood. 

Xenophon, four hundred years earlier, in his panegyric on 
the Spartan monarch, A-ges'i-la'us, had said : 

"Clashing their shields together, they pushed, they fought, 
they slew, they were slain. . . . But when the battle was 
over, you might have seen, where they had fought, the 
ground clotted with blood, the corpses of friends and ene- 
mies mingled together, and pierced shields, broken lances, 
and swords without their sheaths, strewed on the ground, 
sticking in the dead bodies, or still remaining in the hands 
that had wielded them when alive." 

Tacitus, a hundred years later, in his life of Agricola, will 
say : 

" The sight on the open field was then striking and hor- 
rible ; they pursued, they inflicted wounds, they took men 
prisoners, and slaughtered them as others presented them- 
selves. . . Everywhere were seen arms and corpses, mangled 
limbs, and the ground stained with blood." 

Lon-gi'nus, the famous Greek writer on rhetoric, quotes 
Xenophon's sentence to illustrate the rhetorical effect pro- 



The Latin Reader. 97 



duced by the omission of conjunctions. Our readers will 
instinctively feel how much more powerfully the impression 
is made of the hurry, the huddle, the horror, of the scene, 
by the writer's letting the circumstances appear crowded and 
heaped one upon another, in description too swift and ex- 
cited for conjunction and arrangement. 

Let our readers also observe that, whether or not as in 
imitation of a Greek model, the Roman Sallust here intro- 
duces a trait of writing not characteristic either of Sallust, 
or of the Roman : he speaks of the scene described as 
"frightful." 

Five days after suffering this defeat, Jugurtha's confeder- 
ate, King Bocchus, desires Marius to send him two trusted 
ambassadors for a conference. Sylla is one of the two sent. 
Sylla forestalls what Bocchus may say, with a very specious 
and seductive address to the monarch. This address, though 
short, we must omit. The purport of it was to dispose Boc- 
chus to desert Jugurtha's alliance for the alliance of the Ro- 
mans. Bocchus replied yieldingly, but was by hired friends 
of Jugurtha immediately persuaded out of his mind again. A 
short interval of reflection, however, restored Bocchus's pru- 
dent purpose, and he dispatched a select embassy of five, 
empowered to treat, first with Marius, and then, on Marius's 
approving, with the Roman senate, for peace on any terms 
whatever. 

It chanced that these five ambassadors fell, on their way, 
into the hands of robbers who so frightened them that, being 
let go, they fled to Sylla. Sylla received them with munificent 
courtesy. Sallust says that " interested bounty in those days 
was still unknown to many," whereby he accounts for it that 
these simple barbarian folk concluded from Sylla's conduct 
toward them that the reports of Roman avarice were false, 
and that generous Sylla must surely be their friend. Sal- 
lust's cynical smile leers out upon you here from between 
the lines. Sylla promised his guests every thing they asked 



98 Preparatory Latin Course i?i English. 

for. He gave them lessons in the proper way to address 
Marius and the senate, and, at the end of forty days, dis- 
missed them delightfully penetrated with the idea that dis- 
interested kindness, if nowhere else at home in this un- 
friendly world, had at least found refuge with Lucius Sylla. 

Three of the ambassadors were sped on to Rome, and two 
went back to Bocchus, who was especially well-pleased with 
their report of Sylla's politeness. The senate gave answer 
that Bocchus should have Roman friendship and alliance — 
when he should have deserved them. This parsimonious as- 
surance from Rome made Bocchus send for his friend Sylla. 

Sylla, setting out with a suitable escort, was met on his way 
by Volux, Bocchus's son. This encounter was at first sus- 
pected to be hostile, as Volux had with him a body of horse 
whose loose array made their number, about a thousand, 
seem greater than it was. Volux and Sylla marched together 
in amity two days. On the third day, Volux came distressed 
to Sylla with the news that his scouts reported Jugurtha 
close at hand. The Mauritanian (Moor) urged Sylla to flee 
along with him under cover of darkness. Sylla responded 
in good Roman character; but he did adopt the suggestion 
of Volux that they should continue their forward march by 
night. Sunrise found them tired and about to encamp, when 
suddenly they learned that Jugurtha was but two miles away. 
'Perfidy'! exclaimed some; Met us take vengeance at once 
on Volux.' Sylla, himself suspicious, kept cool, and inspirited 
his men. He, however, with imprecations to Jupiter the al- 
mighty on wicked Bocchus, ordered Volux to quit the camp. 
The Moor protested his innocence, and adjured Sylla to 
trust him. He advised Sylla to go boldly straight through 
the camp of Jugurtha. This the fearless Roman actually 
did, and without suffering molestation. 

The end now hastens. It is Sylla's unscrupulous, adroit, 
and audacious contrivance that entraps the wily Jugurtha, 
and delivers him into the hands of Marius. Jugurtha, it 



The Latin Reader. 99 



seems, had a Numidian envoy at Bocchus's court to act as 
spy on the conduct of his doubtful Moorish ally. The as- 
tuteness of this ambassadorial spy was no match for the pro- 
found policy of Sylla playing upon the facile faithlessness of 
Bocchus. The first step was taken by Bocchus. Bocchus 
gave Sylla to understand that he himself was ready to agree 
to any thing. It was, however, he said, necessary to let Ju- 
gurtha's man be present at their interviews. Sylla replied 
that before said personage he would speak sparingly, and 
see Bocchus again apart. It was accordingly arranged by 
Sylla that Bocchus, at the close of the formal interview, 
should, inJthe presence of Jugurtha's representative, tell Sylla 
to come back in ten days and get the king's answer. This 
was done, and the two withdrew to their respective camps. 
But in the middle of the night, Sylla, according to the plan 
concerted between them, was summoned secretly back by 
Bocchus, who, to trust Sallust's report of it, made the Ro- 
man lieutenant a remarkable speech, profuse in professions 
of personal attachment and gratitude. Sylla replying told the 
king in effect that promises from an enemy situated as he, 
Bocchus, now was, at disadvantage, would signify little to the 
Roman senate and people. He, Bocchus, would have to do 
something substantial. It lay in his, Bocchus's, power to 
put Rome under real obligation. He could betray Jugurtha 
to her. Bocchus started back. Why, there was the kindred 
tie, the solemn league, between himself and Jugurtha. Be- 
sides, Jugurtha was beloved, and the Romans were hated, by 
his, Bocchus's, subjects. Sylla pressed, and Bocchus — 
yielded. An ambush was laid, and the father-in-law de- 
livered up the son-in-law to Sylla. It was a proud feather 
in young Sylla's cap. But it was before the chariot-wheels 
of Marius that, afterward, Jugurtha, with his two sons, was 
driven in triumph at Rome. 

Sallust's history stops abruptly with Jugurtha's capture. 
From other sources we learn that the proud captive lost his 



ioo Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

senses under the dreadful humiliation of the triumph ; also 
that soon after, with much contumelious violence, he was 
flung naked into the chill under-ground dungeon at Rome 
called the Tullianum, where after six days he perished of 
cold and starvation. (One authority says he was strangled.) 
He is said to have exclaimed shudderingly, as he fell, 
" Heavens, a cold bath this of yours ! " 

Jugurtha is painted black in Sallust's picture. But the 
artist that painted him, remember, is a foe and a Roman. 
Jugurtha must have been, indeed, a false and bloody man. 
Still he had followers that clave to him. Nay, Jugurtha was 
to all Africans the most beloved of men. He was univers- 
ally hailed as deliverer of the nation from Rome. His name 
long continued a spell of power to his countrymen. It was 
twenty years after his death — and already his kingdom was 
in large part a province of Rome — when a son of his, recog- 
nized in the force opposed to the Romans, raised such sen- 
timents in the breasts of a Numidian corps attached to the 
Roman army, that the whole body had to be immediately 
sent home to Africa. 

Jugurtha's bravery, his talent, his endurance, redeem him 
to our admiration, as do his misfortunes to our sympathy. 
Supposing Jugurtha had been the conqueror, and some 
Numidian partisan of his, instead of a Roman partisan of 
Caesar's, had given us the history ! Imagine the difference ! 
Instead of " Punic faith " as now, the phrase, " Roman faith," 
might then have been the proverbial irony for false dealing. 

There is, outside of the Bible, no history that is not merely 
a version of history. 

Ovid 

(Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso is the full Roman name) was 
born in Northern Italy. It is striking how few, compara- 
tively, of the great Roman writers were natives of Rome. 
Ovid came of a good family, and he liked to have this 
known. "In my family," he says, "you will find knights up 



The Latin Reader. 101 



through an endless line of ancestry." He was born just 
when the republic died ; that is, he and the imperial order 
came twins into the world together, in 43 B.C. The boy was 
a natural versifier. Like Pope, he "lisped in numbers, for 
the numbers came." His youth coincided either with the 
full maturity, or with the declining age, of the great Au- 
gustan writers, Virgil, Livy, Horace, Sallust. Unhappily for 
himself, he did not come under the sunshine that streamed 
on literature and art from the face of Augustus's great min- 
ister, Mae-ce'nas. The emperor never extended his favor to 
Ovid ; and in the end, as our readers know, the poet was 
sent into exile. 

Ovid was a man of loose character, and his looseness of 
character leaked into his verse. In fact, much of what he 
wrote is now unreadable for rank impurity. One of his 
poems in particular scandalized the moral sense of even his 
own age, and became the ostensible occasion of his banish- 
ment. His " Metamorphoses " must be considered his chief 
work. The title means, literally, " changes of form." Ovid's 
idea in the poem is to tell in his own way such legends of 
the teeming Greek mythology as deal with the transforma- 
tions of men and women into animals, plants, or inanimate 
things. The inventive ingenuity of the poet is displayed in 
connecting these separate stories into something like coher- 
ence and unity. This poem has been a great treasury of 
material to subsequent poets. Even Milton has conde- 
scended to be not a little indebted to Ovid for images or 
allusions, which he dignified by adopting them, with noble 
metamorphosis, into his own loftier verse. 

For our first specimen of Ovid's Metamorphoses, we select 
a passage which does not indeed, as properly perhaps it 
should, contain an instance of transformation, but which 
nevertheless is an interesting and a celebrated story capable 
of various moral application. It is the story of Pha'e-ton, 
or Pha'-e-thon. We are able to give this in a version which, 



102 Preparato?y Latin Course in English. 

if it is not quite so closely literal as would be desirable, is 
excellent art of its kind, and is, at any rate, a classic too in 
English, for it is from the hand of Joseph Addison. 

For the benefit of the more inquisitive among our read- 
ers, we may mention that Lippincott's re-issue of Ancient 
Classics for English Readers contains an admirable volume 
on Ovid. There is in Bonn's Classical Library a very good 
prose translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses entire, accom- 
panied with enlightening notes. There have, first and last, 
been a considerable number of English translations made, 
both in prose and in verse, of Ovid's poetry. Two small 
volumes, published by Harper & Brothers, compile various 
partial rhymed versions by different hands, among them 
Dryden, Pope, Congreve, and Addison. These pieces of 
translation are all of them, perhaps, a little antiquated in 
tone and style, and they are of exceedingly unequal merit. 
They have the recommendation of being very accessible. 

Our readers will like, by way of introduction to our exem- 
plification of Ovid's Metamorphoses, to see what the poet 
himself — in one of his most delightfully buoyant moods 
surely it must have been — thought of his own work as a 
whole. We give, accordingly, the conclusion of the Meta- 
morphoses in literal prose translation : 

And now I have completed a work, which neither the anger of Jove, 
nor fire, nor steel, nor consuming time will be able to destroy ! Let 
that day, which has no power but over this body of mine, put an end to 
the time of my uncertain life when it will. Yet, in my better part, I 
shall be raised immortal above the lofty stars, and indelible shall be my 
name. And wherever the Roman power is extended throughout the 
vanquished earth, I shall be read by the lips of nations, and (if the 
presages of the poets have aught of truth) throughout all ages shall I 
survive in fame. 

There is, perhaps, no part of Ovid's poem that constitutes 
upon the whole a better warrant to the poet for his cheerful 
anticipation of enduring fame, than that which we now in 



The Latin Reader. 103 



specimen present. Phoebus (Apollo) is god of the sun. He 
is applied to by his not universally acknowledged son, Phae- 
ton, with a startling request. Obedient to the straitening 
demands of space, we omit the brilliant opening which de- 
scribes the dazzling palace and the richly decorated en- 
thronement of the god. Phaeton has arrived and presents 
himself. To Phoebus's gracious welcome of his son, 

" Light of the world," the trembling youth replies, 
" Illustrious parent ! since you don't despise 
The parent's name, some certain token give, 
That I may Clymene's proud boast believe, 
Nor longer under false reproaches grieve." 

The tender sire was touched with what he said, 
And flung the blaze of glories from his head, 
And bade the youth advance. " My son," said he, 
" Come to thy father's arms ! for Clymene 
Has told thee true : a parent's name I own, 
And deem thee worthy to be called my son. 
As a sui-e proof make some request, and I, 
Whate'er it be, with that request comply: 
By Styx I swear, whose waves are hid in night, 
And roll impervious to my piercing sight." 

The youth, transported, asks without delay, 
To guide the sun's bright chariot for a day. 

Phoebus is distressed. He begs Phaeton to reconsider 
and choose more wisely for himself. This at considerable 
length and with much poetical eloquence. But Phaeton was 
not to be dissuaded, and the reluctant father has his chariot 
brought out. Then at daybreak, 

He bids the nimble Hours, without delay, 
Bring forth the steeds: the nimble Hours obey. 
From their full racks the generous steeds retire, 
Dropping ambrosial foams, and snorting fire. 
Still anxious for his son, the god of day, 
To make him proof against the burning ray, 
His temples with celestial ointment wet, 
Of sovereign virtue, to repel the heat ; 
Then fixed the beamy circle on his head, 
And fetched a deep foreboding sigh, and said : 



io4 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



" Take this at least, this last advice, my son : 
Keep a stiff rein, and move but gently on : 
The coursers of themselves will run too fast ; 
Your art must be to moderate their haste. 
Drive them not on directly through the skies, 
But where the zodiac's winding circle lies, 
Along the midmost zone ; but sally forth, 
Nor to the distant south, nor stormy north. 
The horses' hoofs a beaten track will show ; 
But neither mount too high, nor sink too low. 
That no new fires or heaven or earth infest, 
Keep the mid way ; the middle way is best : ' 
Nor where, in radiant folds, the serpent twines, 
Direct your course, nor where the altar shines. 
Shun both extremes ; the rest let Fortune guide, 
And better for thee than thyself provide ! " 




HELIOS, OR SOL. 

Meanwhile the restless horses neighed aloud, 
Breathing out fire, and pawing where they stood. 
Tethys, not knowing what had passed, gave way, 
And all the waste of heaven before them lay. 
They spring together out, and swiftly bear 
The flying youth through clouds and yielding air ; 
With wingy speed outstrip the eastern wind, 
And leave the breezes of the morn behind. 
The youth was light, nor could he fill the seat, 
Or poise the chariot with its wonted weight : 
But as at sea the unballasted vessel rides, 
Cast to and fro, the sport of winds and tides, 
So in the bounding chariot, tossed on high, 
The youth is hurried headlong through the sky. 
Soon as the steeds perceive it, they forsake 
Their stated course, and leave the beaten track. 



The Latin Reader. 105 



The youth was in a maze, nor did he know 

Which way to turn the reins, or where to go : 

Nor would the horses, had he known, obey. 

Then the seven stars first felt Apollo's ray, 

And wished to clip in the forbidden sea. 

The folded serpent, next the frozen pole, 

Stiff and benumbed before, began to roll, 

And raged with inward heat, and threatened war, 

And shot a redder light from every star ; 

Nay, and 'tis said, Bootes, too, that fain 

Thou wouldst have fled, though cumbered with thy wain. 

The bewildered charioteer is racked with emotions which 
Ovid feels himself at leisure enough to describe with great 
particularity. Then follows a very detailed account, with 
many geographical names, of the progressive effects of that 
unguided drive. We omit and resume : 

The astonished youth, where'er his eyes could turn, 
Beheld the universe around him burn : 
The world was in a blaze ; nor could he bear 
The sultry vapors and the scorching air, 
Which from below, as from a furnace, flowed : 
And now the axle-tree beneath him glowed. 
Lost in the whirling clouds that round him broke, 
And white with ashes, hovering in the smoke, 
He flew whei-e'er the horses drove, nor knew 
Whither the horses drove, or where he flew. 

'Twas then, they say, the swarthy Moor begun 
To change his hue, and blacken in the sun ; 
Then Libya first, of all her moisture drained, 
Became a barren waste, a wild of sand ; 
The water-nymphs lament their empty urns ; 
Boeotia, robbed of silver Dirce, mourns, 
Corinth Pyrene's wasted spring bewails ; 
And Argos grieves while Amymone fails. 

The floods are drained from every distant coast ; 
Ev'n Tanais, though fixed in ice, was lost ; 
Enraged Caicus and Lycormas roar, 
And Xanthus, fated to be burnt once more. 
The famed Mseander, that unwearied strays 
Through many windings, smokes in every maze : 
From his loved Babylon Euphrates flies : 
The big-swollen Ganges and the Danube rise 
In thickening fumes, and darken half the skies : 
In flames Ismenos and the Phasis rolled, 
And Tagus, floating in his melted gold : 
5* 



io6 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



The swans, that on Cayster often tried 
Their tuneful songs, now sung their last, and died. 
The frighted Nile ran off, and under ground 
Concealed his head, nor can it yet be found ; 
His seven divided currents all are dry, 
And, where they rolled, seven gaping trenches lie : 
No more the Rhine or Rhone their course maintain, 
Nor Tiber, of his promised empire vain. 
The ground, deep cleft, admits the dazzling ray, 
And startles Pluto with the flash of day : 
The seas shrink in, and to the sight disclose 
Wide naked plains, where once their billows rose ; 
Their rocks are all discovered, and increase 
The number of the scattered Cyclades; 
The fish in shoals about the bottom creep ; 
Nor longer dares the crooked dolphin leap : 
Gasping for breath, the unshapen Phocoe die, 
And on the boiling wave extended lie : 
Nereus, and Doris, with her virgin train, 
Seek out the last recesses of the main : 
Beneath unfathomable depths they faint, 
And secret in their gloomy caverns pant : 
Stern Neptune thrice above the waves upheld 
His face, and thrice was by the flames repelled. 
The Earth at length, on every side embraced 
With scalding seas, that floated round her waist, 
When now she felt the springs and rivers come, 
And crowd within the hollow of her womb, 
Uplifted to the heavens her blasted head, 
And clapped her hand upon her brows, and said, 
(But first, impatient of the sultry heat, 
Sunk deeper down, and sought a cooler seat ) : 
" If you, great king of gods, my death approve, 
And I deserve it, let me die by Jove : 
If I must perish by the force of fire, 
Let me transfixed with thunderbolts expire." 



Jove called to witness every power above, 
And even the god whose son the chariot drove, 
That what he acts he is compelled to do, 
Or universal ruin must ensue. 
Straight he ascends the high ethereal throne, 
From whence he used to dart his thunder down, 
From whence his showers and storms he used to pour, 
But now could meet with neither storm or shower : 
Then, aiming at the youth, with lifted hand, 
Full at his head he hurled the forky brand 
In dreadful thunderings. Thus the almighty sire 
Suppressed the raging of the fires — with fire. 



The Latin Reader. 107 



At once from life and from the chariot driven, 
The ambitious boy fell thunder-struck from heaven ; 
The horses started with a sudden bound, 
And flung the reins and chariot to the ground: 
The studded harness from their necks they broke, 
Here fell a wheel, and here a silver spoke, 
Here were the beam and axle torn away, 
And scattered o'er the earth the shining fragments lay. 
The breathless Phaeton, with flaming hair, 
Shot from the chariot like a falling star, 
That in a summer's evening from the top 
Of heaven drops down, or seems, at least, to drop, 
Till on the Po his blasted corpse was hurled, 
Far from his country, in the western world. 

A "long bright river " of verse it is, in the original, and in 
the translation as well. We have been sorry to break the 
current with omissions. You, however, lose nothing essential. 
You simply fail to receive, as through any condensed citation 
you would necessarily fail to receive, a due impression of the 
melodious prolixity, the " linked sweetness long drawn out," 
which is characteristic of Ovid. 

The foregoing episode about Phaeton is taken from the 
second book of the Metamorphoses. (There are fifteen 
books in all.) As we said beforehand, and as our readers 
have now seen, it does not include an example of transfor- 
mation. But there is plenty of transformation in the sequel 
of the story, as given in the rest of the second book. Phae- 
ton's sisters, while mourning their brother, are changed into 
trees, and a male kinsman of his, similarly engaged, finds him- 
self suddenly a swan. Jupiter, visiting the earth to mend 
the mischief caused by Phaeton's adventure, commits some 
characteristic mischief of his own, which his wife Juno, 
jealous with reason, revenges by making a bear of the 
unhappy victim of her husband's lust. Areas, son by Jupiter 
to that victim, being about to slay his unrecognized mother, 
in her form of bear, presto, Jupiter plants them both among 
the constellations of the sky. These are but a few of the 
transformations with which Ovid fills the sequel of his story 
of Phaeton. Our readers will guess that here they have 



108 Preparatory Latiti Course in English. 

Ovid's account of the origin of the constellation, Ursa Major, 
and perhaps, too, of the neighboring constellation, Ursa 
Minor — the mother being the Greater Bear, and her tender 
son, the Lesser. 

Ovid's fondness for making his stories always about as 
long as he^ can — which means longer than any body except 
Ovid could make them — creates for us great difficulty in lay- 
ing before our readers, within allowable limits of space, as 
great a variety of instances as we should be glad to present, 
of this poet's quality. We must not dismiss the example al- 
ready offered without adding one or two suggested remarks. 

In Burke's celebrated " Letter to a Noble Lord," one of the 
greatest masterpieces of indignant sarcasm to be found in 
literature, occurs this sentence, " I was not, like his Grace of 
Bedford, swaddled, and rocked, and dandled into a legis- 
lator — Nitor in adversum is the motto for a man like me." 
Burke's Latin phrase is taken from a line in the foregoing 
passage of Ovid. "I steer against their motions," Addison 
renders it freely. More literally, it is, " I struggle against 
opposition." 

The words which Addison translates, " Keep the mid way, 
the middle way is best," our readers will recognize in its 
original Latin as a familiar quotation for recommending the 
proverbial wisdom of the golden mean : 

Medio tutissimus ibis. 

The legend of Phaeton is conceived by many to have 
had its origin in some meteorological fact — an extraordinary 
solar heat perhaps, producing drought and conflagration. It 
has even been connected, by a rather fanciful conjecture, 
with the burning of the cities of the plain, and also with the 
staying of the sun at the command of Joshua. Chrysostom 
offers the suggestion of Elijah's rapture in his chariot of fire. 
Plutarch explains that Phaeton was a Molossian king who 
drowned himself in the Po — lively Lucian to this explanation 



The Latin Reader. 109 



of Plutarch's adding, that the monarch, having a mind to 
astronomy, died before completing his observations, whence 
the story of his not knowing how to drive to the goal. And 
now our readers, from among these various modes of ex- 
plaining the myth of Phaeton, shall choose to suit themselves ; 
or if this they cannot do, then, either give the puzzle up, or 
invent a solution of their own, whichever course may please 
them best. 

We shall not violently shock the unity, the progress, or the 
true effect, of the Metamorphoses, if we go back now, as let 
us do, to the first book for our second specimen. There is, 
in truth, no proper organic unity to Ovid's Metamorphoses. 
The successive stories selected by the poet to be told are 
just ingeniously tacked together by some association more or 
less natural, and that is all. The interest of the work is the 
interest of its episodes. In fact the work consists of its 
episodes. To point out the connection of this story with 
that, would in most cases be merely curious, not at all in- 
structive. By disregarding, as we do, the order of the poem, 
we best point out to our readers the fact that the poem has 
no order that needs to be regarded. 

Dryden shall be our next translator — a bold, free, manly, 
mind, gifted with more of talent than of real genius, but 
writer of verse that is secure of place among the imper- 
ishable classics of English literature. You will feel increase 
of vigor, as you will feel diminution of urbanity, elegance, 
and grace, in passing from Addison to Dryden. On the 
other hand, such readers as may take the pains to compare 
Dryden translating Ovid with Dryden translating Virgil, will 
observe that the native force of this writer is sympathetically 
modulated to more softness and sweetness in representing 
the poet of the Metamorphoses. Let us choose the pretty 
story of Daphne's transformation into a laurel. We shall omit 
in places, indicating our omissions by dotted lines. Apollo 
is the — hero, shall we call him ? of a most unmanly, if too 



no Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

godlike, adventure in which Daphne, daughter of the river 
Peneus, is the heroine, or victim. Disregarding the contrac- 
tion of verbal forms which Dry den and Addison affect, we 
print, for instance, "viewed," instead of "view'd," as do 
they. It is observable, however, that Tennyson, too, whose 
judgment in such things it is safer generally to accept than 
to reject, makes the line light to the eye by the practice 
which we decide to honor rather in the breach than in the ob- 
servance. The mutilated aspect of words thus contracted is 
hardly, we think, compensated for by merely ocular illusion 
of greater lightness in the line. 

Apollo had disdainfully bidden stripling Cupid lay aside 
bow and arrows, as weapons proper to himself alone, and un- 
suitable for such as the infant god of love. Whereupon 
Cupid takes revenge by piercing Apollo's breast with passion 
for Daphne. We omit some opening lines : 

So burns the god, consuming in desire, 
And feeding in his breast a fruitless fire : 
Her well-turned neck he viewed, (her neck was bare,) 
And on her shoulders her disheveled hair: 
" O were it combed," said he, " with what a grace 
Would every waving curl become her face ! " 
He viewed her eyes, like heavenly lamps that shone, 
He viewed her lips, too sweet to view alone. 
Swift as the wind the damsel fled away, 
Nor did for these alluring speeches stay. 

"Stay, nymph," he cried, " I follow, not a foe. 
Thus from the lion trips the trembling doe ; 
Thus from the wolf the frightened lamb removes, 
And from pursuing falcons fearful doves : 
Thou shunn'st a god, and shunn'st a god that loves. 

Yet think from whom thou dost so rashly fly ; 
Nor basely born, nor shepherd's swain am I. 
Perhaps thou know'st not my superior state ; 
And from that ignorance proceeds thy hate. 
Me, Claros, Delphos, Tenedos, obey ; 
These hands the Patareian sceptre sway : 
The king of gods begot me : what shall be, 
Or is, or ever was, in fate, I see : 
Mine is the invention of the charming lyre : 
Sweet notes, and heavenly numbers, I inspire 



The Latin Reader. in 



Sure is my bow, unerring is my dart ; 
But ah ! more deadly his who pierced my heart. 
Med'cine is mine ; what herbs and simples grow 
In fields and forests, all their powers I know, 
And am the great physician called below. 
Alas ! that fields and forests can afford 
No remedies to heal their love-sick lord : 
To cure the pains of love no plant avails ; 
And his own physic the physician fails." 

She, urged by fear, her feet did swiftly move, 
But he more swiftly, who was urged by love. 

The nymph grew pale, and, in a mortal fright, 

Spent with the labor of so long a flight, 

And now despairing, cast a mournful look 

Upon the streams of her paternal brook : 

44 O help," she cried, 4 'in this extremest need ! 

If water-gods are deities indeed ; 

Gape earth, and this unhappy wretch entomb ; 

Or change my form, whence all my sorrows come." 

Scarce had she finished, when her feet she found 

Benumbed with cold, and fastened to the ground ; 

A filmy rind about her body grows ; 

Her hair to leaves, her arms extend to boughs : 

The nymph is all into a laurel gone ; 

The smoothness of her skin remains alone. 

Yet Phcebus loves her still, and casting round 

Her bole his arms, some little warmth he found. 

The tree still panted in the unfinished part, 

Not wholly vegetive, and heaved her heart. 

He fixed his lips upon the trembling rind ; 

It swerved aside, and his embrace declined : 

To whom the god : " Because thou canst not be 

My mistress, I espouse thee for my tree : 

Be thou the prize of honor and renown ; 

The deathless poet, and the poem, crown: 

Thou shalt the Roman festivals adorn, 

And, after poets, be by victors worn : 

Thou shalt returning Caesar's triumph grace, 

"When pomps shall in a long procession pass ; 

Wreathed on the post before his palace wait, 

And be the sacred guardian of the gate : 

Secure from thunder and unharmed by Jove ; 

Unfading as the immortal poweis above : 

And as the locks of Phoebus are unshorn, 

So shall perpetual green thy boughs adorn." 

The grateful tree was pleased with what he said, 
And shook the shady honors of her head. 



ii2 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Dazzled and perplexed amid so many brilliant things from 
which to choose, we pitch next upon the tragic story of 
Ni'o-be. This — for the sake of variety, as well as for the 
sake of letting our readers, in this final example, see a more 
exact reproduction of the very words and forms of the 
original — we will give from the literal prose translation of 
Ovid's " Metamorphoses " furnished in Bohn's Classical Li- 
brary. It would seem that Niobe (wife of Am-phi'on, king 
of Thebes) was of a temper haughty even to impiety. When 
sacrifice and worship were demanded from the Thebans by 
La-to na, mother of Apollo and Di-a'na, to be paid to herself 
and her two divine children, Niobe advanced her own claim 
to such honors in rivalry with the divinities. To punish her, 
Apollo slew her seven sons and seven daughters. We omit 
the horribly realistic details of the shooting of the seven sons 
by the archer god. Suffice to say, these had been duly and 
divinely shot : 

The sisters were standing in black array, with their hair disheveled, 
before the biers of their brothers. One of these, drawing out the weap- 
on sticking in her entrails, about to die, swooned away, with her face 
placed upon her brother. Another, endeavoring to console her wretched 
parent, was suddenly silent, and was doubled together with an invisible 
wound ; and did not close her mouth, until after the breath had de- 
parted. Another, vainly flying, falls down ; another dies upon her sis- 
ter ; another lies hid ; another you might see trembling. And now six 
being put to death, and having received different wounds, the last only 
remains ; her mother covering her with all her body, and with all her 
garments, cries, "Leave me but one, and that the youngest ; the young- 
est only do I ask out of so many, and that but one." And while she 
was entreating, she, for whom she was entreating, was slain. Childless, 
she sat down among her dead sons and daughters and husband, and be- 
came hardened by her woes. The breeze stirs not a hair ; in her 
features is a color without blood ; her eyes stand unmoved in her sad 
cheeks ; in her form there is no appearance of life. Her tongue itself, 
too, congeals within, together with her hardened palate, and the veins 
cease to be able to be moved. Her neck can neither be bent, nor can 
her arms give any motion, nor her feet move. Within her entrails, too, 
it is stone. 



\ 



The Latin Reader. 113 



Still did she weep on ; and, enveloped in a hurricane of mighty wind, 
she was borne away to her native land. There, fixed on the top of a 
mountain, she dissolves ; and even yet does the marble distil tears. 

Our readers will recall Byron's magnificent comparison of 
the desolated city of Rome : 

" The Niobe of nations ! there she stands, 

Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe ; 

An empty urn within her withered hands, 
Whose holy dust was scattered long ago." 

Shakespeare's " Like Niobe, all tears " is one of those 
commonplaces of quotation multitudinously supplied by the 
tragedy of Hamlet. 

The stories of miraculous metamorphosis were even in an- 
cient times the subject of much ingenious conjectural inter- 
pretation. We hardly have space here to accumulate ex- 
amples of the guesses that have been made to explain the 
origin and meaning of these myths. 

We have not, of course, pretended to give any thing like a 
full account of Ovid's " Metamorphoses." To do so would far 
exceed our space. But it would in any case be tedious, and 
not very profitable. Some monuments of architecture there 
are, which, besides being composed of choice stones exqui- 
sitely wrought, are great wholes whose aggregate mass and 
proportion impress you with an effect of grandeur or beauty 
infinitely surpassing the sum of the effects due to all the 
component parts taken together. Of such a structure a few 
stones by themselves would give a very inadequate idea. 
But the " Metamorphoses " of Ovid form an edifice from 
which a number of shapely and polished precious blocks 
brought away will serve to suggest all the beauty that be- 
longs to the building. You have merely to say, There are a 
great many lovely pieces like these. You could not truly 
say, The glory of the whole is greater than that of the sum 
of all the parts. 

Ovid had predecessors in the treatment of his subject. To 



ii4 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

these predecessors how much he was indebted, we have no 
means of judging. The earlier works have perished, and no 
critics who knew them have transmitted to us their estimate 
of Ovid's obligation. We need hardly say that Ovid's fore- 
runners were Greek. 

If any reader of ours has the means at command, and 
therewith the curiosity too, to go further than we forward him 
in the study of Ovid's " Metamorphoses," he will find The 
Golden Age, Nar-cis'sus at the Fountain, Daed'a-lus and 
Ic'a-rus, Pyr'a-mus and This'be, Bau'cis and Phi-le'mon, 
charming episodes for his examination. Of the story of 
Baucis and Philemon, Hawthorne makes a lovely idyll, 
clothed upon with more than Ovidian grace, in his " Won- 
der-book." Hawthorne's, " The Golden Touch," in the same 
volume, is that magical genius's treatment of Ovid's " Midas." 
Indeed, you could not do better, for entrance into the spirit 
of these old myths delightfully modernized, than to read Haw- 
thorne throughout in his two collections, "Wonder-book" 
and " Tanglewood Tales." No one will need to be reminded 
of the interlude of Pyramus and Thisbe, interspersed through 
Shakespeare's" Midsummer Night's Dream." A good many 
Americans will have become familiar with Mr. John G. 
Saxe's comical rendering of the same story. Milton's " Ly- 
cidas," (notably the allusion in it to Orpheus,) and his 
11 Comus," especially the song in it to Echo, are full of Ovid. 

Since the publication of the volume answering to this, in 
Greek, we have received from correspondents in various 
parts of the country, courteous letters of request to have col- 
lateral reading suggested in private communications, addi- 
tionally illustrative of the subjects introduced in our text. 
In some instances, these applications have proceeded from 
persons writing on behalf of circles and coteries of readers 
who were making their perusal of the book a genial social 
exercise. To all such friends of ours we will say that a com- 
parative reading of the different English poems named by us 



The Latin Reader. 



"5 



as in part drawn from Ovid, together with Hawthorne's ex- 
quisite handling of Ovidian topics, would certainly prove at 
once instructive and delightful. The same is true of other 
productions in English literature elsewhere mentioned in 
connection with the various Latin authors represented. 

We must now take lingering leave of Ovid, to go on in the 
following chapter with an author who, to a character of so- 
cial dilettanteism in which he might have rivaled Ovid him- 
self, joined a character of stern and strenuous practical force, 
for affairs of war and of state, in which he scarcely admitted 
any rival ancient or modern — we mean, Julius Caesar. We 
barely add that Ovid's verse in the " Metamorphoses " is the 
same as that of Virgil and of Homer, namely, the dactylic 
hexameter. No Latin poet ever made his numbers more 
tunable than did Ovid. 




HEAD OF MEDUSA. 



n6 Preparatory Laii?i Course in English. 



VI. 

CESAR. 

We put our readers on their guard. The present writer 
is not a disciple of Carlyle. He is no idolater of power. 
He does not believe that might makes right. He is not, 
therefore, a member of that school of thinkers who fall 
down speechless in worship before Caesar. We have honestly- 
tried, in the pages that follow, to do scrupulous justice to 
that great character — as much so as if he were still a living 
man among us, to be pleased or to be pained with award of 
human praise or blame. We have, however, found it quite 
impossible not to feel, and not sometimes to vent, a sentiment 
of indignation at the monstrous things that Caesar could do. 

We have been, no doubt, prompted the more to this by the 
present prevalence of the opposite tendency, the tendency not 
simply to apologize for, but boldly to glorify, the man. Let 
it be considered that it is not against Caesar, the individual 
man, but against Caesar, the great embodiment of a certain 
spirit, pagan in general and Roman in particular, that our 
zeal of condemnation here or there irrepressibly kindles. 

" The foremost man of all this world," is what Shakes- 
peare, in his tragedy bearing for title the illustrious Roman's 
name, makes Brutus, who had stabbed him, speaking to 
Cassius, who also had stabbed him, call Julius Caesar. The 
general agreement of thoughtful minds has tended to affirm 
Brutus's sentence, and this in a meaning of his expression 
higher and larger than that which Shakespeare probably in- 
tended to represent Brutus as intending to convey. Fore- 
most in position and power, rather than foremost in rank of 
personal greatness, was, we suppose, what Shakespeare's 
Brutus meant. But there is, with judges presumptively com- 
petent to pronounce opinion, a strong disposition, to say the 
least, to accord to Julius Caesar a place of lonely pre-emi- 



Ccesar. 



"7 



nence, as, upon the whole, in amplitude of natural endow- 
ment, and in splendor of historic achievement, perhaps the 
very first among the sons of men. 

It undoubtedly requires much comprehensive and compara- 
tive knowledge of the heroes of history, to appreciate the 
large-molded, many-sided character of such a man as Caesar. 
Julius Caesar is great in an order of greatness like that, for 




CESAR. 



instance, of Mont Blanc or of Niagara among the works of 
nature ; of St. Peter's or of the Milan Cathedral among the 
works of human hands. You have to study him to measure 
him. You have to put other great men alongside of him, 
to perceive how he dwarfs them by the contrast of his easy 
and symmetrical magnitude. 

In the present volume, we are to let Caesar, in large part, 
make his own impression of himself by one of his literary 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



works. This work is the account which he wrote of his cam- 
paigns in Gaul. " Commentaries " is the name by which the 
account is technically known. The word " commentaries " 
in this title is not, of course, to be understood as signifying 
remarks in criticism and explanation. It is used in the sense of 
memoirs or memoranda. In the entitling of Caesar's book, it 
has — it perhaps was designed to have — the effect of modesty. 
It is as if to forewarn the reader, This is not an elaborate 
work of literary art ; it is simply a collection of sketches or jot- 
tings. And, in fact, Caesar's memoirs of his campaigns are said 
to have been written from time to time, in the course of duty 
performed by him as military commander in arduously act- 
ive service in field and in camp. They have somewhat the 
character of journals of camp and march and fight. 

They are, for all that, much admired for the style in 
which they are written. Clear, straightforward, simple, 
manly records they are, of great achievements, hardly, but 
triumphantly, performed. Caesar writes constantly in the third 
person, never, save in some three or four, perhaps inadvertent, 
certainly unimportant, cases of exception, in the first. That 
is, when he means Caesar he says " Caesar," not " I," or " me." 
There is scarcely any thing more remarkable in the book 
than the impersonal form under which the strong person- 
ality of writer and actor is forced by the writer to appear. 
You would scarcely guess, from merely reading the book, 
that the writer of the book is the same man as he who fur- 
nished the matter of action which the book was written to 
report. Given the fact that Caesar is the author, you then 
immediately feel that the author could have been no other 
than he. But, without that clue, the idea might never have 
occurred to your mind. The external evidence, however, is 
ample for Caesar's authorship of the " Commentaries." 

What did Caesar write his memoirs for? Such a detail of 
his activity was not required by the government at Rome. 
The answer probably is, Caesar felt himself a public roan. 



Casar. 119 



He had the consciousness of great aims. He felt that he 
could do things worthy of record, and he felt, moreover, 
that he could produce a record worthy of the things that he 
should do. In addition to this more abstract incentive, he, 
no doubt, had a directly practical purpose in writing his 
" Commentaries." The book would advance his fortunes at 
Rome. 

For Caesar was unboundedly ambitious. He wanted to be the 
lord of the world. We impute this motive freely with all con- 
fidence. Let every reader, however, keep wisely on his guard. 
Motives are generally matters of inference only. Cicero says 
that Caesar had habitually on his tongue that sentiment from 
Euripides, " If you may ever rightly do wrong, you may do so 
for the sake of obtaining sovereign power." He wished in his 
distant wars to act under the gaze of mankind. He should 
need the support of wide admiration and confidence from 
his countrymen, in the future movements that he might find 
it necessary to make, in his race for the first place of power 
among men. Still, Caesar relates his own exploits with sin- 
gular self-restraint. There is not a particle of apparent dem- 
onstration. A tone of quiet and candor prevails through- 
out his story, which would be the perfection of art, were it 
art, but which probably is in the main the unaffected, unsought 
expression of a great nature, in complacent harmony with 
itself. Caesar's singleness of purpose as a man helped him 
as a writer. It forbade his allowing any literary vanity to 
disturb the serenity of his style. Every other ambition was 
servant in Caesar to the ambition to be the first man in the 
first city in the world. 

We are not to read Caesar's " Commentaries," as if the au- 
thor's years of unparalleled activity in Gaul were a mere un- 
related episode, brilliant, but barren, in his career. We are 
rather to read them — but there are two quite different ways 
in which we may read Caesar's Gallic " Commentaries." Either 
we may regard them as telling the story of the thorough and 



120 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

masterful manner in which he accomplished an important 
share of certain serious work that it fell to his lot to do for 
Rome and for the world; or we may regard them as giving 
account of a piece of canvassing, on his part, for place 
and power in the Roman state, canvassing conceived and 
executed on a scale of largeness and enterprise beyond the 
reach of any but the most magnificent political as well as 
military genius. But whichever of these two views we 
take, it still remains true that this history is vitally related 
to the whole subsequent history of mankind. 

We shall, in reading Caesar's story, seem to be reading only 
how consummate skill and discipline in war, supported by 
boundless resources, overwhelmed brave, but helpless, bar- 
barism, with the irresistible mass and weight of an equally 
brave, but also a splendidly equipped, civilization. But let 
us correct our very natural misconception of the case. The 
truth is, the Gauls were by no means a wholly uncivilized 
people, and they were a really formidable foe to Rome. For 
good reason, Rome dreaded them with immemorial dread. 
One of the saddest and most shameful of the early traditions 
of Roman history was the taking and sacking of the city by 
Gauls. A vast, dense, black cloud of ever-threatened irrup- 
tion hung, growing, in the quarter of the Roman sky toward 
Gaul and Germany, ready to break on Italy and pour a flood 
of devastation against Rome that should even sweep the city 
from the face of the globe. Caesar's bold plan was to open 
the cloud and disperse its gathering danger. He perhaps 
saved Europe to civilization and to Christianity. Four hun- 
dred years later, the barbarians pressed again against the 
barriers of the Roman empire. This time the barriers gave 
way, and the floods came in. But meantime, and this as the 
result of Caesar's work, Gaul itself, indeed all Europe, west 
and south, with Africa, too, had been permanently Roman- 
ized ; and there was moreover now a Christian Church pre- 
pared to welcome the inrushing barbarians to her bosom, 



Ccesar. 121 

and make them, retaining much, no doubt, of their native 
fierceness still, yet strangely gentle pupils in the school of 
Christ. 

With how much far forecast, on his own part, of all this 
long reach of influence, to be exerted through his deeds, 
on the future fortune of Rome, Caesar accepted and admin- 
istered his governorship of Gaul, it is of course impossible 
now to say. It is hard, however, not to feel that glorifying 
historians, like Mommsen, of Caesar, have found much states- 
manlike wisdom in Caesar's career, which in point of fact it 
never entered the great Roman's mind to conceive. Provi- 
dence is wiser in state than any man, and it is poor philos- 
ophy of history to be over-confident in projecting back- 
ward upon Caesar's credit for foresight, results of his activ- 
ity that in all probability he neither planned, nor expected, 
nor desired, nor even conjectured. The historian of Caesar 
thus magnifies the man by giving him adjuncts not his, and 
by applying standards of measurement too large to be laid 
off against any one but God. Caesar was wise in his genera- 
tion. He knew how to make himself master of Rome. Let 
him have his praise. But he was not a prophet. And he 
was too selfish to be a patriot. And with all his greatness, 
he was not great enough to be a lover of mankind. The 
type of greatness that embraces the human race, that antici- 
pates all time, was born into this world with Jesus of Naz- 
areth precisely one hundred years after the birth of Caesar. 
It was not Caesar's individual fault that he kept within the 
limits of the ideas of the non- Christian ancient world. But 
so it is not to be made his individual praise that he over- 
passed those limits; for he did not overpass them. Caesar 
was just a Roman, with Roman traits, both good and bad, 
carried to their highest expression. He was the impersona- 
tion, the idealization, the realization, of the Roman genius 
for conquest and government. He had the cold blood and 
cruelty of Rome. 
6 



122 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Our readers will observe, as they go forward in the Com- 
mentaries, occasional mention made of Caesar's absences, 
during the winters, in Italy. These absences of Caesar from 
Gaul, during that season of the year in which military oper- 
ations were usually suspended, were not for the purpose 
of mere pleasure and relaxation, on his part, in the capital. 
Caesar, in fact, did not visit the capital. Friends and follow- 
ers from the capital visited him instead, where he held for 
them almost regal court at Luca (modern Lucca) in North 
Italy. These Italian winters of his were a part, an essential 
part, of Caesar's long, patient, watchful, skillful, audacious, 
successful, tragic game in Roman politics. The senate had 
banished him — if the senate intended to banish him — to Gaul, 
in vain. He was still present in Rome more potently than 
ever. Our readers will better understand the relation of 
Caesar's experience in Gaul to the rest of his life, if we pause 
long enough at this point to sketch briefly his previous career. 

Caius Julius Caesar was of an ancient patrician family of 
Rome, who claimed derivation from lulus, son of Trojan 
-^Eneas. The word Caesar was made by Caius Julius a name 
so illustrious, that it came afterward to be adopted by his 
successors in power at Rome, and finally thence to be trans- 
ferred to the emperors of Germany, and to the autocrats of 
Russia, called respectively Kaiser and Czar. Caesar was 
politician from a boy. He was married (or perhaps only 
betrothed) early enough to get himself divorced at seventeen, 
for the purpose of allying himself to Cinna through a second 
marriage with that democratic leader's daughter. This wife, 
too, the dictator, Sylla, now omnipotent at Rome, advised 
young Caesar to put away. Caesar had the spirit to refuse 
compliance, but he had also the prudence to flee from Rome 
to escape the dictator's resentment. Before he fled, Sylla 
had warned him of his danger by taking away his office, his 
inheritance, his dowry by his wife. When, upon Syila's 
death, Caesar got back to Rome, he won popular favor by 



Ccesar. 123 

bringing an indictment for extortion in Macedonia against 
Dolabella. His taste of applause as public speaker excited 
him to become a master of eloquence. He repaired to 
Rhodes for study with a celebrated rhetorician there. On 
his way, he was taken by pirates who asked thirty thousand 
dollars in ransom. He agreed to pay this sum, but at the 
same time laughingly told the pirates that if they knew who 
he was, they would ask fifty thousand dollars. Let me but 
catch you, he said, and I will crucify you to a man. They 
thought Caesar a merry fellow; but he promptly got together 
a number of ships, pursued them, captured them, and, taking 
the law into his own hands, true to his word put them all to 
death on crosses. The young student then went on to his 
rhetorical professor. 

Having been chosen pontifex, he returned to Rome, where 
he went rapidly through a succession of public offices : as 
quaestor, bidding for popularity by pronouncing a eulogy on 
his aunt Julia, wife of the redoubtable democrat Marius; 
as sedile, still further courting the favor of the common 
people by entertainments provided on a scale of unmatched 
magnificence, and of course at correspondingly enormous 
expense. The result was to plunge him millions on millions 
of dollars in debt. Now occurred the conspiracy of Catiline, 
in which Caesar himself was implicated, in the suspicion of 
some. The mere existence of the suspicion tends to show 
how active and how unscrupulous in politics Caesar was 
held to be. Mommsen, the German historian of Rome 
already before alluded to, a warm eulogist of Caesar, holds it 
for tolerably certain that his hero was in fact a fellow-con- 
spirator with Catiline ; nor does he on that account (or on 
any other account) at all abate the great man's praise. 

He wanted to be pontifex maximus, that is, chief priest of 
the Roman religion. Caesar was a thorough-paced skeptic, 
and his aim in this matter was wordly-minded in the ex- 
treme : he needed the office as a refuge from his creditors. 



124 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Without it he would have to flee from Rome. A rival candi- 
date offered to pay Caesar's debts for him, if he would with- 
draw his name from the canvass. " I would double my 
debt, if that were necessary," was Caesar's reply. "I shall be 
pontifex maximus this day or I shall be an exile," he said to 
his mother on the morning of the election day. He was 
triumphantly elected. The next year saw him praetor. At 
the close of the year's praetorship, he was, in due course of 
Roman custom, given a province to squeeze. Spain was his 
lot. He here, by levying war on the native tribes bordering 
the province, found means to amass money enough to ease 
him of his debts, which, by the way, to the pretty sum of 
five millions of dollars, his friend Crassus had had to become 
surety for, before Caesar, in the first instance, could leave 
Rome for Spain. From Spain, at the end of his term of 
office in that province, this masterful spirit hastened back to 
Rome to run for the consulship. The consulship was the 
top round in the ladder of Roman political ambition. Caesar 
saw all things possible to himself once chosen consul. He 
was chosen. His colleague was Bibulus, a stiff senatorial 
conservative, joined with Caesar in office in order to check 
that politician's popular arts. But honest Bibulus became 
so manageable in Caesar's hands that there might nearly as 
well have been one consul instead of two. In fact, it was a 
saying at Rome that the two consuls were — Julius and 
Caesar. Caesar's consulship, in its bearing on his own per- 
sonal fortunes, was an overflowing success. He steadily 
opposed the oligarchy of the senate (for the Roman republic, 
so-called, was in reality a senatorial oligarchy) — he got a law 
enacted for distributing lands to the poor (the poor being 
chiefly the soldiers of Pompey, which great Roman was now 
to be made Caesar's friend) — he won the favor of the knights 
by relieving them, as the senate had refused to do, from a 
burdensome contract into which they had entered with the 
state for collection of revenue : in short, he made himself 



Cczsar. 125 

an overwhelmingly popular man. It was now that, with 
Pompey, the most honored man in Rome, and Crassus, per- 
haps the richest, Caesar, undoubtedly the ablest, formed that 
famous political fellowship which has acquired the name of 
the first triumvirate. 

Caesar's consulship expired, he went to Gaul as proconsul. 
His term of proconsular government was at first fixed for 
five years, an unusual length of term, afterward, however, 
extended to ten years, though eight years was the extreme 
limit of time that Caesar actually spent as governor of Gaul. 
Before the other two years were done he had outgrown 
Gaul. In four years more he had made himself emperor of 
the world, in every thing but the name, and then, after less 
than twelve months' enjoyment of the long-coveted su- 
premacy, had fallen in death, under numerous wounds from 
his friends, at the base of the statue of that former colleague 
of his, great Pompey, against whom he had meantime waged 
deadly war, and who had himself also but a short time be- 
fore been treacherously slain. It is a dreadful history. 
Caesar's glory is emblazoned in blood. 

For the subsequent and closing parts of his career, Caesar's 
campaigns in Gaul, which we are here about to study in his 
own record of them, were a necessary preparation. It was 
for these campaigns that he at first obtained control of the 
legions which were soon to be the weapon in his hand for 
hewing his way to sovereign power. It was in these cam- 
paigns that he disciplined those legions to become, perhaps, 
the best soldiers the world ever saw, and that he attached 
them so remarkably to his own person and fortune. The 
whole course of subsequent history would have been incal- 
culably different, but for the momentous transactions which 
we learn of from Caesar's Commentaries. The occurrences 
which the Anabasis of Xenophon relates, have their bearing 
on the general history of mankind in but an incidental and, 
as it were, fortuitous way. In Caesar's Commentaries, on 



126 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

the contrary, we give our attention to affairs that directly 
affected the destiny of the civilized world. 

Caesar's style is correspondingly different from the style 
of Xenophon. There is a largeness of handling, a virility, a 
force, in the Roman's work, which in the Grecian's we do 
not find. In compensation, Xenophon has more grace, more 
humanity, than Caesar. Caesar, we may as well frankly con- 
fess it, has stretches that are drier than any in Xenophon. 
We make our peace with Latin specialists for this compara- 
tive slight to an author who is universally, with good reason, 
their admiration and delight, by quoting here a sentence from 
learned Roger Ascham, tutor to Queen Elizabeth. In his 
" Schoolmaster," this early and excellent writer on educa- 
tion, says : " In Caesar's Commentaries is seen the unspotted 
propriety of the Latin tongue." We may adapt a familiar 
quotation, and, of Caesar, with the change of a word or two, 
say exactly what stately Edmund Spenser said of Chaucer : 

Dan Chaucer, well of English undefiled, 
becomes 

Great Julius, well of Latin undefiled. 

This we think with all our heart, and yet believe that our 
readers will be contented to have less of his narrative in 
Caesar's own words, than, in the case of Xenophon, we were 
sure they would unanimously demand. Undoubtedly one 
feels that Caesar is of the two the greater man. But un- 
doubtedly, also, one feels that of the two Xenophon is the 
more pleasing writer. 

Out of the eight books comprised in Caesar's Gallic Com- 
mentaries, the preparatory student is usually required to 
read only four. We, however, with our accustomed liberality 
toward our friends, shall try to give them a fairly satisfactory 
account of the entire work. Each book recounts the events 
and incidents, these and no more, of one campaign, covering 
a military year of time. 






CcBsar. 127 

First Book. 

The first book, after a bit of geography to begin with, oc- 
cupies itself with two series of military operations on Caesar's 
part, one directed against the Helvetians, (Swiss,) and one 
against a body of Germans who had invaded Gaul. Our 
readers will, not only here, but elsewhere at points through- 
out the volume, find in the elegant colored map provided by 
the enlightened liberality of the publishers, a convenient 
elucidation of the text. 

It seems that there is among the Helvetians a man with 
ideas. Or-get/o-rix is his name. This Orgetorix proposes to 
his countrymen a whole national migration. To prevent, 
or rather to turn back, this movement, deemed by Caesar 
threatening to the Roman province of Gaul-beyond-the- 
Alps — a margin of territory along the Mediterranean coast, 
with Marseilles (Massilia) for its chief town — was the first 
object of the new governor's first Gallic campaign. 

The Helvetians have already, after two years of provident 
and laborious preparation, begun to move. Their towns and 
villages burned behind them, they are already on the banks 
of the Rhone, seeking the most eligible route to their desti- 
nation, which is a district of country lying to the west, out- 
side their native mountain fastnesses. 

But Caesar appears. They ask his permission to cross the 
Roman province. Caesar will answer them in two weeks. 
The two weeks Caesar spends in putting himself in safe con- 
dition to answer them no. The Helvetian emigrants persist- 
ing make several attempts to pass the Rhone, which failing, 
they turn in another direction. 

Caesar posts to Italy. Quickly back again with ample re-en- 
forcements, he hears from the ^Eduans that the Helvetians 
are overrunning their country. The ^Eduans were old allies 
of Rome. Caesar undertook to help them. He follows up the 
line of the emigrant Helvetians. Seizing his opportunity, 



128 Preparatory Latin Course in Ejiglish. 

he falls upon a fourth part of the Helvetian horde, left still 
upon the hither bank of a river they were crossing, and cuts 
them in pieces. Caesar recalls that it was this particular 
canton of the Swiss which had, in a former generation, slain 
a Roman consul and compelled that Roman consul's army 
to pass under the yoke. A coincidence, he thinks, that the 
same canton should be the one now to feel the stroke of 
retribution. Caesar had a kinsman who suffered in that an- 
cient calamity. This personal wrong also was redressed. 
Readers will be interested to know just how close home to 
Caesar had come the wrong thus vicariously avenged. The 
man concerned was the grandfather of Caesar's father-in- 
law ! 

The Helvetian body, the three fourths that were left of 
them, sued for peace. Caesar demanded hostages. They 
were accustomed, so they haughtily replied, to receive hos- 
tages, not to give them. The great multitude staggered for- 
ward. Caesar dogged them watchfully. 

But his provisions were failing. The ^duans had prom- 
ised to victual his army. They paltered and postponed. 
Caesar at length learned what the difficulty was. There was 
one ^Eduan who had the spirit not to be a Romanizer. 
Caesar guessed his man. It was a brother of Div'i-ti'a-cus, 
and Divitiacus was a chief whom Caesar could not afford to 
offend. This man, Dumnorix by name, had influence enough 
to make the ^Eduans keep back the promised supplies. 
Caesar warned him to beware, but forgave him this time for 
his brother's sake. 

The Romans now turn aside in quest of provisions. The 
Helvetians mistook the movement for retreat. They pursue, 
and give Caesar his chance. They fight at disadvantage, 
and after a desperate struggle are defeated. 

But the duel was long, and for a time it even seemed 
doubtful. When finally the Romans prevail, the emigrants 
retire, one part up a mountain near by, and the other to 



Ccesar. 



129 



their baggage trains. No Roman, Caesar testifies, saw that 
day the back of a foe. The conflict lasted all the long 
summer afternoon. It was prolonged at the wagons far into 
the night. The end came at last, and the Romans got pos- 
session of the emigrants' baggage and encampment. The 
daughter, and a son, of Orgetorix were among the captives. 

All this was a good while ago, but it was highly real 
when it happened. Caesar's mention of Orgetorix's daughter 
irresistibly stimulates the imagination of the thoughtful 
modern reader of his story, to conceive the multiplied and 
diversified distress endured by the Swiss, in this experience 
of armed and fighting migration. Old men, tender women, 
little children, there were, huddled helplessly together in the 
Helvetian quarters — bereavement, destitution, death, captivity 
worse than death, staring them in the face — while husbands, 
sons, fathers, brothers, sweethearts, by scores and by hun- 
dreds, fell before their very eyes, bravely but vainly fighting 
there for every thing dear to the heart of man. War, Caesar, 
with Roman magniloquence, called this dreadful business. 
Butchery would be a better name. 

Caesar relates that about one hundred and thirty thousand 
emigrant survivors of the struggle marched — men, women, 
and children, think of it, and after an endless afternoon of 
such agony — all that night, without a moment to rest, and 
wearily on and on — until on the fourth day they reach, " all 
that was left of them," the country of the Lin'go-nes. To the 
Lingones, Caesar — choking down any gasp of sympathy for 
the sufferers he might have the weakness to feel rising in 
his Roman breast — sends word that they must give no aid 
whatever, not so much as a crust of bread, to the Helve- 
tians, on pain of being regarded by him in the same light as 
were they. The Romans, an unusual thing for Romans 
under Caesar, have to wait three days before pursuing the 
refugees. 

With arithmetical calmness, Caesar gives the number of the 
6* 



130 Preparatory Latin Course i?i English. 

enemy, according to lists found in the captured camp of the 
Helvetians. There had set out from home in all three 
hundred and sixty-eight thousand emigrants. There returned, 
for there was a return, under what auspices effected we shall 
presently see, one hundred and ten thousand. In round 
numbers, a quarter of a million souls perished or were made 
slaves, as the result of that disastrous exodus. 

Excavations made under the munificent auspices of Napo- 
leon III., uncovered, in some of the localities identified as 
scenes of Caesar's Gallic slaughters, vast deposits of human 
remains, in which could be distinguished the skeletons of 
men, women, and children. 

Mr. J. A. Froude has written an elaborately studied and 
highly readable life, by him entitled " Sketch," of Julius Caesar. 
The work is conceived and is executed throughout in a spirit 
of unbounded, not to say unscrupulous, ascription to the au- 
thor's hero. A fair estimate — that of Napoleon III., biogra- 
pher surely devoted enough to Caesar — makes the actual fight- 
ing force engaged in the struggle just described nearly equal 
on the two sides, not far from sixty thousand men to each. 
The Helvetians may have had a few thousand more than the 
Romans, perhaps seventy thousand against sixty thousand. 
Mr. Froude, however, apparently forgetting that the great 
mixed multitude of the emigrants did not raise to a very 
high figure their effective combatant strength, says that the 
Helvetians were " enormously superior " in numbers to 
Caesar's army. 

Mr. Froude also says that " Caesar treated the poor creat- 
ures [the survivors] with kindness and care." Caesar, after 
unconditional surrender on the part of the fugitives, com- 
manded the Al-lob'ro-ges to furnish them with plenty to eat, 
and sent them, so victualed at the expense of his allies, 
back to their own deserted and desolated homes with orders 
there to rebuild their towns and villages. This constituted 
Caesar's " kindness and care," and this constituted the whole 



Ccesar. 131 

of it. Caesar, regardless of future biographers, is at pains 
to let it be known that he, for his part, had no sentimental 
reasons for his "kindness and care." He says: "This he 
did, chiefly, on this account, because he was unwilling that 
the country from which the Helvetians had departed, should 
be untenanted, lest the Germans, who dwell on the other 
side of the Rhine, should, allured by the excellence of the 
lands, cross over from their own territories into those of the 
Helvetians, and become borderers upon the provinces of 
Gaul and the Allobroges." 

Caesar, by the way, saved his character, as a sound practical 
man of affairs and no sentimentalist, by excepting from his 
" kindness and care " some six thousand men of the Helve- 
tians who, after the general surrender, made off in the night 
to seek safety for themselves rather than depend upon the 
clemency of their conqueror. " These he considered, when 
brought back, in the light of enemies," a pregnant expression 
from the frugal pen of Caesar. The euphemism means that 
he had six thousand unarmed and helpless prisoners of war 
butchered in cold blood. The people through whose terri- 
tory the escape was attempted, were required by Caesar to 
do the catching and bringing in of the fugitives. 

Thus ended the Helvetian war— war, to indulge Caesar in 
his own non-descriptive word. The future dictator had be- 
gun prosperously in Gaul. Already he had made up his 
score to one quarter of the full million of human lives that 
he must take in Gaul, to prepare himself for by and by crossing 
the Rubicon, on his way to empire and to bloody death. 

Here let the thought of that expiation awaiting this ruth- 
less conqueror give us check and pause. Our indignation 
and horror must not hurry us into injustice toward Caesar. 
This was not Caesar, except as Caesar was Rome. Hardly 
more, perhaps, was it Rome, except as Rome was the ancient 
pagan world. We say this, but we feel that we ought to qual- 
ify with an exception in favor of the Greeks. Xenophon, 



132 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

for example, relating an incident of peculiar distress to 
his enemies, comments upon it with humanity : "A dreadful 
spectacle was then to be seen." No such token of sympa- 
thy, on the part of the soldier and author, even once relieves 
the arctic pages of Caesar. Sentiment like that was Grecian, 
not Roman. In the present instance, however, we have no 
reason for supposing otherwise than that the wretched Hel- 
vetians would, in the place of conquerors, have been every 
whit as cruel as were the Romans. It is natural to side with 
the weak. But we must in doing so take care not to be un- 
just to the strong. And, here at least, we may comfort our- 
selves with remembering it was for the good of mankind that 
the strong should prevail. 

Victorious Caesar now sat at the receipt of congratulations. 
Ambassadors from almost all parts of Gaul hastened to his 
head-quarters to thank him for his services. One would 
like much to know with what degree of literal accuracy Caesar 
has condescended, in that indirect fashion of his, the oraiio 
obliqua so called, (which is the delight of drill-masters in Latin I 
desiring to initiate their pupils into the mysteries of the re- 
flexive pronoun and of the subjunctive mood) — one, we say, 
would gladly know with what measure of regard for strict 
fidelity to fact, Caesar has condescended to make his oblique 
report of the speeches delivered to him by these effusive 
ambassadors ! 

The crowded first Gallic campaign of Caesar is to be closed 
with a series of operations better deserving, than did the 
slaughter of the pilgrim Helvetians, to be styled a war. 
A certain Ar'i-o-vis'tus, German prince and conqueror, 
invoked at first as ally by one of the Gallic tribes at war 
among themselves, has turned intolerable oppressor and 
usurper, menacing especially the prosperity and power of the 
^Eduans. 

Caesar at once resolves on interfering. His first step of 
course is to send an embassy to Ariovistus. Ariovistus 



Ccesar. 133 

must meet Caesar in conference. Ariovistus demurs, and 
Caesar insists. There is thrust and parry between the two in 
diplomatic interchange. Caesar stings Ariovistus with a 
charge of ingratitude to himself and the Roman people. 
Ariovistus retorts that Rome governed her conquered as she 
chose, and that he, Ariovistus, claimed a similar privilege 
for himself. Let Caesar come on if he liked. He, Caesar, 
would soon learn what Germans, inured from infancy to 
war, and never once during fourteen years sheltered under a 
roof, were able to accomplish. 

Whatever the effect produced on Caesar's own mind by Ari- 
ovistus's bold attitude, Caesar's camp at any rate is now the 
scene of singular commotion. Staggering reports reach the 
soldiers respecting the enemy they are about marching to 
meet. The Germans are of gigantic stature, they are in- 
credibly brave and incredibly skillful in arms. Their very 
looks are frightful. You could not withstand the mere 
fierceness of their eyes. At these reports, the whole army 
of Caesar is panic-stricken. 

The civilians — present in camp as friends of Caesar, place- 
holders there perhaps by personal favor and spectators rather 
than sharers of the campaign — were the first to feel, and they 
communicated, the fright. Urging various reasons why it 
was necessary for them to leave, some of these begged Caesar 
kindly to excuse them and let them withdraw ; while others, 
ashamed to appear afraid, yet could not with all their efforts 
keep their countenances composed, or even always restrain 
their tears. They got together in groups of mutual com- 
miseration, and, hidden within the tents, gave themselves up 
to moans of despair. Throughout the camp, there was a 
universal making of wills. (This feature of the panic is fairly 
farcical. If the extremity was so desperate, who, pray, was 
going to carry the sealed testaments to Rome and see that 
they were duly executed ?) It was a scene of general demor- 
alization. The most experienced soldiers did not escape the 



134 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

spreading contagion. Officers even began to yield. They 
did not fear the enemy, not they, but the narrow roads, the 
vast forests, the failing supplies ! Caesar was warned that 
his soldiers would not obey a command to advance. 

Here was a situation for a general. But there was a 
general for the situation. Caesar summoned his officers 
to council and lectured them sharply. He reasoned with 
them, but he also brought his will to bear upon them. 
In short, he used the language of one born to command, as 
well as of one born to pursuade. It was the will, no doubt, 
quite as much as the reasons, that prevailed. But if Caesar 
in fact overbore with his will, he did not disdain to give his 
centurions a chance to save their own self-respect. They 
might, if they preferred, feel that they were overborne by his 
representations. He shrewdly excited the spirit of mutual 
emulation. He said if the rest of the army all failed him, 
he would march on with his tenth legion alone. Caesar's 
tenth legion, by the way, was his favorite body of soldiers. 
It became famous, immortal indeed, in history. It is a prov- 
erb still for loyalty, valor, effectiveness. 

Caesar frankly admits that his address told surprisingly on 
his hearers. The general feeling was completely changed. 
Enthusiasm took the place of panic. The tenth legion sent 
to thank their commander for his compliment to them. 
They were ready, they said, to march to the war. The cen- 
turions now generally explained, each one that he had not 
been afraid, that he had not taken it upon him to distrust 
Caesar's wisdom. They were, each man of them, too well 
instructed in duty. 

Caesar was prudently gracious and he accepted their ex- 
cuses. Hastened instead of retarded by the mutinous state 
of his army, he broke camp and set out in the fourth watch, 
that is, between three and six in the morning. (The Roman 
night was divided into four watches of three hours each, the 
length of the hour varying with the season of the year.) 



Ccesar. 135 

Seven days of Caesar's marching brings him within about 
twenty miles of Ariovistus. 

Ariovistus hears of an approach so important to himself, 
and sends ambassadors to Caesar. A conference, to be held 
in the saddle, was agreed upon. Caesar had to extemporize 
a cavalry escort that he could trust. He dismounted the 
Gallic cavalry, and on their horses seated his tenth legion. 
The extemporized cavalry were well pleased with the ar- 
rangement. One of them facetiously remarked: i You have 
done more for us than you promised. You promised to 
make us your pretorian cohort. But here we are all of us 
knights.' (The Latin word for horseman meant also mem- 
ber of a certain privileged order, namely, the knights. It is 
fair, however, to apprise our readers that there is another 
explanation of the soldier's pleasantry. According to this 
other explanation, there is no pun in the case. The soldier 
simply felicitates himself with his comrades on their good 
fortune in being converted from foot-soldiers into cavalry. 
We advise our readers to choose the first explanation, and, 
with undisturbed confidence, enjoy their pun. Those, how- 
ever, who take Dr. Johnson's severe view of puns, as worth- 
less wit, are supplied with their alternative.) 

We can afford to skip the pages of oblique report in which 
Caesar gives his account of what passed between the two 
generals in their conference. Again there was thrust and 
parry on either side ; but the result of course was that they 
parted without arriving at any agreement. A movement on 
the part of the German cavalry escort was interpreted by the 
Romans as hostile. Caesar on this withdrew. He was solic- 
itous, he says, that no chance should be given the enemy for 
saying that they had been ensnared at the conference. On 
a signal subsequent occasion, as our readers will see, Caesar 
was less solicitous. 

Battle cannot now be much longer postponed. However, 
Caesar draws up his army before Ariovistus in challenge to 



136 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

engagement, day after day, without result. A description 
given of the German military method is interesting. (We 
use, for our extracts in strict translation from Caesar, chiefly 
the version of Professor William Duncan, of the University 
of Aberdeen. A more accessible, but far inferior, work is 
the translation printed in Bonn's Classical Library.) 
Caesar : 

They had about six thousand horse, who chose a like number out of 
the foot, each his man, and all remarkable for strength and agility. 
These continually accompanied them in battle, and served them as a 
rear-guard, to which, when hard pressed, they might retire ; if the ac- 
tion became dangerous, they advanced to their relief ; if any horseman 
was considerably wounded, and fell from his horse, they gathered round 
to defend him ; if speed was required, either for a hasty pursuit, or sud- 
den retreat, they were become so nimble and alert by continual exercise, 
that, laying hold of the manes of their horses, they could run as fast as 
they. 

Ariovistus at length hazards an attack. This was about 
midday. A hot fight raged all the afternoon. From some 
German prisoners taken, Caesar learned at evening the reason 
why Ariovistus had been so slow in coming to an engage- 
ment. It seems the German matrons, who practiced some 
sort of divination, warned him not to fight until the new 
moon. 

The Germans now prepare for the inevitable decisive en- 
counter. They marshal their army by cantons or tribes, of 
which Caesar enumerates seven, all with barbarous names. 
They surround the whole army with their chariots and 
wagons, on which are placed their women, who, with dishev- 
eled hair and in tears, implore the warriors, moving forward 
to battle, not to deliver them into Roman slavery. 

Caesar quietly introduces a change in the organization of 
the legion. Over each legion he sets a lieutenant and a 
quaestor to act as witnesses, and so as stimulators, of the valor 
of the men. Previously to this there seems not to have been 



Ccesar. 137 

any unity given to the legion by the existence of a general 
officer for the whole body. Caesar this time commences the 
attack himself. The enemy meet him more than half way. 
They rush forward so prompt and so swift, that the battle is 
joined hand in hand before javelins can be thrown. The 
Germans form a phalanx. On this close-locked array, with 
its impenetrable front of shield to shield, the Roman soldiers, 
some of them, in their eager bravery, leaped up and with 
their hands pulling down the shields stabbed at the bearers 
from above. 

Caesar's attack was successful on the right. But on the 
left the Romans suffered. A timely re- enforcement sup- 
ported them at that point, and along the whole line the Ger- 
mans gave way. They fled, fifty miles without stopping, to 
the Rhine. A few escaped, among them, Ariovistus. All 
the rest, dryly observes Caesar, "our cavalry slew.'* Ario- 
vistus had two wives, (monogamy, however, was the rule, 
polygamy the exception, among the Germans,) who both per- 
ished in this flight. There were two daughters. Of these 
one was killed, another captured. 

The rumor of this rout reached a body of Germans who 
had come to the banks of the Rhine intending to cross, and 
sent them back home. Their retreat was not without loss, 
for the Gauls near the river followed them and destroyed 
many lives. 

In his grand way, Caesar closes the first book of his Com- 
mentaries as follows : 

Caesar having in one campaign put an end to two very considerable 
wars, went into winter-quarters somewhat sooner than the season of the 
year required. He distributed his army among the Seq'ua-ni, left La- 
bienus to command in his absence, and set out himself for Cisalpine 
Gaul, to preside in the assembly of the states. 

The winter-quarters of a Roman army had much the char- 
acter of a permanent town. They occupied a considerable 
area. They were fortified in almost every conceivable way. 



138 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

They were supplied with conveniences of various kinds, like 
the cities of the period. Hither Gaul, or Cisalpine Gaul, was 
Northern Italy. The assizes spoken of were sessions of a 
proconsular court such as was customarily held in Roman 
provinces for the administration of justice. Without neglect- 
ing these official duties of his, Caesar, we know, managed be- 
sides to pay some attention to his own personal plans for 
getting on in the world, though of this it does not belong to 
the purpose of the Commentaries to speak. 

Second Book. 

Caesar's winter in Luca is disturbed, perhaps not disagree- 
ably to himself, by reports brought to him that the Belgians 
are " conspiring " against the Roman people. The Belgians 
were made up of different tribes, who now all exchange hos- 
tages among themselves, in pledge of mutual good faith for 
the purpose contemplated. Caesar gives a considerable num- 
ber of reasons for this hostile confederation on the part of 
the Belgians. He might have spared himself his pains. 
There was one sufficient reason to the Belgians for entering 
into their league against Rome — they did not wish to be 
Rome's slaves. 

Caesar at once raises two new legions in Hither Gaul, that 
part of his province in which he then was. The Roman 
legion, by the way, was, in the number of men composing 
it, a somewhat variable quantity. Originally, the number 
was three thousand foot with three hundred horse. Later it 
went up to four, five, and even six thousand men. Caesar's 
legions have been differently estimated ; they were probably 
about forty-five hundred strong. Caesar seldom takes care 
to let us know the exact numerical strength of his own army. 
Habitually, too, he avoids telling the loss and waste of men 
that he suffers. We only read from time to time of his levy- 
ing new legions. His auxiliary forces are usually a pretty 
indefinite addition to his strength. 



Ccesar. 139 

Sudden rapid movement on his part has the usual effect 
on the enemy. The Remi (Rheims, pronounce Reernz, is 
the modern form bequeathed from this Roman name of 
the Belgic tribe) are fairly scared into poltroonery. They 
send ambassadors to Caesar, and make an abject surrender 
of themselves and of all their possessions into Caesar's hands. 
They purge themselves of fault in his eyes, by declaring that 
they had not conspired with the rest, and by volunteering 
information about what their brethren are doing. The poor 
cravens say that the (patriotic) infatuation of the Belgians is 
so great that they, the Remi, could in no wise keep back 
even their own kindred, the Sues-si-o'nes (Soissons is the 
modern derivative) from joining the confederacy. 

The Remi are. like the ^Eduans, after Caesar's own heart. 
He gets the following statistics of numbers from his forward 
informants — we give them in Caesar's own summary : 

He found that the Suessiones had within their territories twelve forti- 
fied towns, and promised to bring into the field fifty thousand men : 
the like number had been stipulated by the Nervians, who, inhabiting 
the remotest provinces of Gaul, were esteemed the most fierce and war- 
like of all the Belgian nations : that the At're-ba'tians were to furnish 
fifteen thousand, the Am'bi-a'ni ten thousand, the Mor'i-ni twenty-five 
thousand, the Men'a-pians nine thousand, the Cal'e-tes ten thousand, 
the Vel'o-cas'sians and Ver'o-man'du-ans the like number ; the ArAi-at 7 - 
i-ci twenty-nine thousand ; and the Con-dru-'sians, Eb'u-ro'nes, Caerce'- 
sians, and Pae-ma'ni, all comprehended under the common name of Ger- 
mans, forty thousand. 

Let not our readers shudder at the aspect of these bristling 
proper names. We show them for this once here, but we 
shall, for the most part, keep them discreetly out of sight 
hereafter. 

Caesar patted those accommodating Romanizers, the Remi, 
on the back, told them to have their whole senate paraded 
before him, and to bring him the children of their chief men 
as hostages. The Remi eagerly obey. 

Meantime, the Belgians are on the march to meet Caesar, 



140 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Eight miles distant from his camp was a town of the Remi, 
Bi'brax by name. This town the marching Belgians pause 
to attack. They well-nigh succeed in taking it the very first 
day. Their plan of operations was like that of the Gauls 
proper in besieging. (The Belgians were not pure Gauls, 
having a strong admixture of German in their blood.) They 
surrounded the whole circuit of the fortifications with men, 
who, casting stones, cleared the walls of defenders. This 
done, they formed a testudo — which Roman military term 
may here properly be explained to our readers. The testudo 
was a certain disposition of troops made for a particular pur- 
pose. It was formed by a body of soldiers closing up to each 
other, the central part with their shields held over their heads, 
to provide complete protection against missiles hurled from 
above, the outer ranks with their shields sloped at an angle, 
to guard all the sides from weapons horizontally thrown. 
The whole appearance resembled the back of a tortoise, 
(whence the name testudo, meaning tortoise.) The testudo 
became a cover under which besieging soldiers could at their 
leisure work safely to undermine walls. This purpose was 
on the present occasion successfully effected by the Belgians. 
But evening fell, and put a temporary period to the progress 
of the operations. 

As soon as it is dark, messengers come from the beleag- 
uered town to Caesar with news that, unless relieved, the town 
must surrender. Caesar loses no time. At midnight he 
sends a detachment of troops, such as Rome had learned, 
from various enemies encountered, to add to her own army 
organization — Numidian and Cretan archers, they were in 
this instance, together with Balearic slingers — to succor the 
distressed inhabitants of Bibrax. The effect was decisive. 
The Belgians stayed only to devastate the neighboring coun- 
try, and then advanced to within two miles of Caesar. Their 
camp was seen, by its line of fires, to have a front of some 
eight miles. 



CcBsar. 141 



Caesar to great audacity joined great prudence. In the 
present case he did not give battle at once. The multitude 
of the enemy was formidable, their repute for valor was 
high. He would first test his soldiers in skirmishes against 
the foe. The result was reassuring. Caesar accordingly re- 
solved on committing himself to the hazard of battle. The 
battle had its vicissitudes, but there was a foregone con- 
clusion of them all. The Belgians, worsted, resolved on 
returning to their respective homes. They broke up their 
camp in the night. The noise was like that of a rout. At 
daybreak, Caesar started in pursuit. 

Labienus, Titus Labienus, was Caesar's ablest and most 
trusted lieutenant. He is destined to fight against his chief 
in the civil war that, in a few years, will follow. This Labie- 
nus was now with three legions set upon the flying foe. 
All day long these dogs of war fed on the helpless Belgians 
as if they had been sheep. Read Caesar's business-like state- 
ment, and consider that it is of hunted men, not of beasts, 
that he is speaking: 

Thus, without any risk to themselves, our men killed as great a num- 
ber of them as the length of the day allowed. 

This was not cruelty ; it was simply cold blood. Cold 
blood was Caesar's strength, and Rome's. Caesar was Rome. 
Let us not forget it — when a writer is heartless, the readers 
whom that writer addresses are probably as heartless as he. 
There was little danger that any one at Rome would charge 
Caesar, do as he might, with acting cruelly in Gaul. It was 
a dreadful world, the world before Christ. 

The very next day, Caesar advanced into the country of 
the Suessiones, neighbors to the Remi. He would give his 
wretched foes no time to rally from their terror and flight. 
But he encounters an obstacle. He finds himself unable to 
take a town, No'vi-o-du'num, or Suessiones, (modern Soissons,) 
by storm, as he passes. He pauses, therefore, to bring up 



142 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

his military engines. Meantime, the returning inhabitants 
swarm into the town. They see what Caesar is doing. Dis- 
mayed at the greatness of his works, such as were never be- 
fore seen or heard of by them, they offer to capitulate to 
Caesar, who, for the sake of the interceding Remi, graciously 
accepts their surrender. He condescends to receive as hos- 
tages the first men of the state, together with "even the two 
sons of king Galba himself." These acts of sovereign grace 
accomplished, Caesar is free to deal next with the Bel-lov'a-ci. 

The Bellovaci had all sought refuge in a certain town, 
toward which Caesar was now making his way. Five miles 
from the town the conquering hero is met by a striking 
and pathetic embassy. All the old men coming out of the 
gates stretched forth their hands to Ccesar, and implored 
him to receive them into surrender. Arrived at the town — 
for Caesar's advance is apparently not hindered at all by so 
picturesque an appeal — and duly encamped, he sees now the 
boys and the women standing ranged on the ramparts, their 
hands reached out toward the Romans, still in sign of sur- 
render, and in piteous dumb plea for compassion. 

Caesar's man Friday, Divitiacus, appears again. He is 
back in Caesar's camp, having, by devastating work in the 
territory of the Bellovaci, done his Roman master impor- 
tant service in creating a diversion that helped break up the 
army of the confederates. The thrifty ^Eduan Romanizer 
now intercedes with Caesar on behalf of the very Belgians 
whose lands he has just been engaged in laying waste. The 
chief motive which actuates this intervention will be seen and 
appreciated from what Caesar reports Divitiacus as saying, 
namely : " That Caesar in granting their request would greatly 
enlarge the credit and authority of the ^Eduans among the 
Belgian states." 

Caesar's policy was always to make great ostentation of 
regard for those who, like this Divitiacus, were exemplarily 
submissive and serviceable to him. He grants grace to the 



Ccesar. 143 

Bellovaci, for the sake of Divitiacus and the ^Eduans. To 
the comparative influence of the Bellovaci among Belgians, 
he pays a distinguished compliment. He will receive from 
them the unusual number of six hundred hostages. 

The next aim of Caesar is the tribe called Ambiani (Ami- 
ens). These incontinently surrender without condition to 
Caesar. 

Beyond the Ambiani live the Nervii. About the Nervii, 
Csesar, inquiring, learns the following particulars : 

That they suffered no resort of merchants into their cities, nor 
would allow of the importation of wine or other commodities tending to 
luxury ; as imagining that thereby the minds of men were enfeebled, 
and their martial fire and courage extinguished ; that they were men of 
a warlike spirit, but altogether unacquainted with the refinements of 
life ; that they continually inveighed against the rest of the Belgians 
for ignominiously submitting to the Roman yoke and abandoning the 
steady bravery of their ancestors. In fine, that they had openly declared 
their resolution of neither sending ambassadors to Caesar, nor accepting 
any terms of peace. 

The foregoing passage, containing, as readers may observe, 
nothing whatever but an abstract of information received by 
Caesar concerning the Nervii, Mr. Froude cites, in its original 
Latin, with these prefatory words, " Caesar thus records his 
admiration of the Nervian character." This English idol- 
ater of Caesar wishes to impress his readers with the idea 
that there was, in his hero's breast, a generous sentiment of 
appreciation for high character in a foe. Bare, bald, cold 
summary of statements brought to Csesar, and by him barely, 
baldly, coldly related, are transformed, by Mr. Froude's 
hero-worshiping imagination, into a record of admiration 
on Caesar's part. Mr. Froude even brings himself, on no 
better authority as appears than that of the passage just 
placed under our readers' eyes, to say that " the abstemious 
Csesar marks with approbation " the water-drinking habits of 
the Nervians. In point of fact, there is not a trace, not a 
shadow, of approval either expressed or implied. Over against 



144 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

laudation like Mr. Froude's of Caesar, set the following expres- 
sion from a great student and authority in Roman history, 
sturdy, Christian Dr. Arnold of Rugby. (We quote from 
his " Later Roman Commonwealth " :) 

" While Caesar was giving tokens of the danger which the 
aristocracy had to apprehend from his political career, he al- 
most lulled their fears by the unbounded infamy of his per- 
sonal character. We will not, and cannot repeat the picture 
which ancient writers, little scrupulous on such points, have 
drawn of his debaucheries ; it will be sufficient to say, that 
he was stained with numerous adulteries, committed with 
women of the noblest families; that his profligacies in other 
points drew upon him general disgrace, even amid the lax 
morality of his own contemporaries, and are such that their 
very flagitiousness has in part saved them from the abhor- 
rence of posterity, because modern writers cannot pollute 
their pages with the mention of them." 

We, for our part, have no occasion here to denounce Caesar, 
and we have no disposition to do so. Let us render the am- 
plest justice to his character. But let us not be dazzled by 
his greatness, to be blind to his wickedness. Our readers 
will wish to have the true view of Caesar; and, from what 
Dr. Arnold is quoted as saying, they may at least see that 
their friend, the present author, is not peculiar in chal- 
lenging the enormous claims made on his behalf by such 
encomiasts as Mr. Froude. Caesar was a great man, but 
he was an evil man. He was perhaps uniquely great ; 
and he was not, which is the best that can be truly said 
for him, he was not uniquely, nay, his time being consid- 
ered, he was not even remarkably, evil. Mr. Anthony 
Trollope has, in the series of Ancient Classics for English 
Readers, a volume on Caesar, in which, while sufficiently eu- 
logizing his hero, the author, wholesomely contrasting herein 
with Mr. Froude, stands up somewhat as an Englishman 
writing in the nineteenth Christian century should, to point 



Ccesar. 145 

out the staring moral deformities in the great Roman's 
character. 

Caesar's struggle with the Nervii was one of the sharpest 
crises that he encountered in the whole course of his Gallic 
experience. Shakespeare showed true art. in making Antony- 
begin his funeral discourse over the dead body of murdered 
Caesar, with an allusion, seemingly the offspring of chance 
reminiscence, to this bloody and glorious moment in the 
dead man's military career. What a stroke it was of artful 
eloquence on Antony's part ! 

You all do know this mantle ; I remember 
The first time ever Caesar put it on ! 
'Twas on a summer's evening in his tent. 
That day he overcame the Nervii. 

The Nervians were beforehand with the Romans in attacking. 
In truth, this time the Romans were taken by surprise. They 
had not a moment to put. themselves in proper order of bat- 
tle. Nay, the men could not even arm themselves as usual. 
It was not so much one battle, as it was a confusion of sep- 
arate battles, that ensued. Caesar for once found himself in 
imminent peril. His officers were slain or disabled. He had 
himself to hasten from point to point as he could. There was 
one moment when all seemed to be over with him and his 
army. A body of his own auxiliary horse actually fled head- 
long home bearing that news to their countrymen. While 
this was happening in one quarter, in another, matters were 
if possible worse for the Romans. 

The men of the twelfth legion were so huddled together 
that they had no room to use their arms to advantage. 
Their centurions were nearly all of them either killed or dis- 
abled, among them the chief centurion, whom Caesar pauses 
to name and to praise — it is Publius Sextius Baculus, an of- 
ficer who will reappear later in the history, rising from a sick 
bed, and, with one brief heroic rally, rescuing a panic-stricken 
camp from the most threatening danger, to sink then in a 
7 



146 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

swoon of utter exhaustion. (Would his pain, think you, have 
been to Publius Sextius Baculus a degree lighter to bear, if 
he could have known that, near twenty centuries after, four 
thousand miles away, you, dear reader, would dwell for a 
moment on his name?) The enemy, at every point, were 
pressing harder and harder. 

Such was the posture of things confronting Caesar. Should 
he order up his reserves ? But there were no reserves. No 
reserve but himself. On that reserve, Csesar confidently fell 
back. He found it a sufficient support. With it he suc- 
cessfully stemmed and turned the rising and foaming tide of 
adverse battle. 

Snatching from a soldier his shield, Caesar pressed to 
the front line of his men. He called his centurions by 
name. He inspirited the rest of the soldiers. ' On with 
the standards,' he shouted. ' Spread out your ranks and 
give yourselves room.' Labienus from a distant point 
discovered the critical situation of affairs. He immediately 
dispatched the tenth legion to give aid, and the aspect of 
the field was instantly and utterly changed. Wounded 
men revived and renewed the fight. Camp-followers un- 
armed met the enemy armed. The cavalry, eager to re- 
trieve their forfeited fame, sought everywhere to be in 
advance of the legionaries. It was now the turn of the 
Nervii to be dismayed. Dismayed, however, as they might 
be, they fought with desperate valor. When a soldier 
among them fell, his comrade behind advancing would stand 
on the corpse and thence continue to fight. He falling in 
turn, and another, and another, still the indomitable Nervii 
would only make mounds of their slain from which to dis- 
charge their weapons on the foe. There was no flight, no 
surrender, no giving way. The Nervii fought till they died. 
But they died almost to a man. The nation and the name 
were well-nigh annihilated. So Caesar says, but we hear 
of the Nervii again by and by, and as redoubtable warriors 



Ccesar. 



147 



still. Perhaps the exaggeration is not so much Caesar's, 
as that of the old men of the Nervii, who sent from their 
marshes to offer themselves, with the women and the chil- 
dren, in surrender to Caesar. They said that their senators 
were reduced from six hundred to three, their fighting men 
from sixty thousand to five hundred. These, "Caesar, that 
he might appear to use compassion toward the wretched and 
the suppliant, most carefully spared." He "ordered them 
to enjoy their own territories and towns, and commanded 
their neighbors that they should restrain themselves and 
their dependents from offering them injury or outrage." 

It is a slip in accuracy on Mr. Motley's part, for that his- 
torian, in the introduction to his "Rise of the Dutch Repub- 
lic," to make Caesar bid " his legions " " treat with respect the 
little remnant of the tribe that had just fallen to record the 
empty echo of his glory." As our readers can see, it was 
not the Roman legions, but the neighbors of the Nervii, on 
whom the purely negative injunction to refrain from outrage, 
was laid. This is not the only fault of too great freedom, in 
the brief spirited report made by Mr. Motley of the present 
passage in Caesar. 

It is time our readers had another taste of Caesar's own 
quality in narration. We give his account of his transac- 
tions, in arms and in diplomacy, with the Aduatuci, a tribe 
of Nervian allies. This tribe had been coming up to assist 
the Nervii. On their way, they heard of the battle just de- 
scribed, and turned back. They threw themselves into a 
town of theirs which Caesar proceeded to attack. 

Caesar says : 

When we had now finished our approaches, cast up a mount, and 
were preparing a tower of assault behind the works, they began at 
first to deride us from the battlements, and in reproachful language ask 
the meaning of that prodigious engine raised at such a distance ! With 
what hands or strength, men of our size and make, (for the Gauls, who 
are for the most part very tall, despise the small stature of the Romans,) 



148 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



could hope to bring forward so unwieldy a machine against their 
walls ? 

But when they saw it removed and approaching near the town, aston- 
ished at the new and unusual appearance, they sent ambassadors to Caesar 
to sue for peace. These being accordingly introduced, told him: "That 
they doubted not but the Romans were aided in their wars by the gods 




BESIEGING TOWER. 



themselves, it seeming to them a more than human task to transport 
with such facility an engine of that amazing height, by which they were 
brought upon a level with their enemies, and enabled to engage them in 
close fight. That they therefore put themselves and their fortunes into 
his hands, requesting only, that if his clemency and goodness, of which 
they had heard so much from others, had determined him to spare 



Ccesar. 149 

the Atuatici [Aduatuci] he would not deprive them of their arms." . . . 
To this Caesar replied : " That no surrender would be accepted unless 
they agreed to deliver up their arms." . . . They accepted in appear- 
ance the conditions offered them by Caesar, and threw so vast a quantity 
of arms into the ditch before the town, that the heap almost reached to 
the top of the wall. Nevertheless, as was afterward known, they re- 
tained about a third part, and concealed them privately within the town. 
The gates being thrown open, they enjoyed peace for the remaining part 
of that day. 

In the evening, Caesar ordered the gates to be shut, and the soldiers to 
quit the town, that no injury might be offered to the inhabitants during 
the night. Whereupon, the Atuatici, in consequence of a design they 
had before concerted, imagining that the Romans, after a surrender of 
the place, would either set no guard at all, or at least keep watch with 
less precaution ; partly arming themselves with such weapons as they 
had privately retained, partly with targets made of bark or wicker, and 
covered over hastily with hides, made a furious sally about midnight 
with all their forces, and charged our works on that side where they 
seemed to be of easiest access. 

The alarm being immediately given by lighting fires, as Caesar before 
commanded, the soldiers ran to the attack from the neighboring forts. 
A very sharp conflict ensued, for the enemy, now driven to despair, and 
having no hope but in their valor, fought with all possible bravery, 
though the Romans had the advantage of the ground, and poured their 
javelins upon them both from the towers and the top of the rampart. 
About four thousand were slain upon the spot, and the rest obliged to 
retire into the town. Next day the gates were forced, no one offering 
to make the least resistance, and, the army having taken possession of 
the place, the inhabitants, to the number of fifty-three thousand, were 
sold for slaves. 

What sum of money the sale of these people brought Caesar, 
he does not descend enough into particulars to name. Num- 
bers of speculators from Rome were no doubt in attendance 
on the progress of conquests so important as these of Caesar 
in Gaul. The bidding, we may presume, was spirited, and 
the prices realized were probably satisfactory. How cold- 
blooded it all seems ! What a different spirit Christianity- 
has infused even into business so unchristian as war ! 

Once again, Caesar has the opportunity to exercise the 



150 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

"clemency" which it suited his suppliants to ascribe to 
their conqueror. This time, however, the conqueror feels 
sufficiently at ease and at leisure to put on very royal airs. 
He tells the embassies from various quarters that wait on 
him, to call again at the beginning of the following season. 
Meantime, having quartered his legions for the winter near 
the scene of their recent exploits, he himself repairs, as in 
the year previous, to Italy. 

In closing the second book of the Commentaries, Caesar 
mentions that a thanksgiving of fifteen days was decreed for 
his victories — an unprecedented honor, he puts force upon 
his moderation to add. The thanksgiving was a religious 
solemnity, graduated in length of continuance according to 
the magnitude of the victories to celebrate which it was de- 
creed. The ordinary period was three days, or five. Pom- 
pey had, on occasion of his subduing Mithridates, enjoyed 
the honor of a thanksgiving of twelve days. Caesar is des- 
tined later, and more than once, to overpass the limit of even 
a fifteen days' thanksgiving. 

During the thanksgiving, the temples of the gods stood 
open. The idols were placed in public on couches arranged 
as if for a banquet about the altars, where the people offered 
them, in the form of rich viands, their tributes of gratitude. 
Nominally religious, this observance was really political and 
personal in character. The public rites of Roman idolatry 
had already become, for the most part, state pomps of the 
hollowest mockery. 

Third Book. 

The third book, as dealing with transactions of less mag- 
nitude than those already narrated, we shall feel quite free 
in condensing. 

Caesar is disappointed to find that his conquering work has 
not made things so comfortable as could be wished for the 
Romans in Gaul. Galba, ancestor of the future emperor of 
that name, left in charge of a force with orders to winter in 






Ccesar. 151 

a certain Alpine region pointed out — if he should find it con- 
venient — did not find it convenient. There was a rising 
against him, and he was obliged to cut his way out of his 
quarters and withdraw into the province. 

More serious was the new posture of things in another 
quarter of Gaul. Quite to the west, a people called the 
Ven'e-ti, living on the Atlantic coast, (in that part of France 
which has since been styled Brittany,) began to make trouble 
for the Romans. The occasion was very simple. It seems 
that young Crassus, son of Caesar's wealthy political partner, 
was left with the seventh legion in Aquitania, (south-western 
France,) to pass the winter. It happened, not unnaturally 
after so many wasting wars, that grain was scarce in Aqui- 
tania. The young gentleman accordingly sent out some 
officers among the neighboring states to "procure" pro- 
visions. Of these agents, or purveyors, two went to the 
Veneti. (By and by, when it becomes necessary in order to 
make good a pretext for war, these emissaries will reappear 
in Caesar's language as " ambassadors.") Well, the Veneti, 
instead of filling up the proffered baskets of these military 
tramps with provisions, seize their persons and detain them. 
This example is followed by the less powerful neighbors of 
the Veneti, and a confederacy is immediately formed among 
all the sea-coast tribes. This sudden confederacy send 
word to Crassus that, if he wants his officers back, he must 
return them their hostages. 

Young Crassus takes advice of Caesar. Caesar was too far 
off to intervene personally, but he orders ships of war to be 
built and the necessary crews, pilots, and so forth, to be got 
ready. 

Such orders as these from Caesar are very suggestive. 
They are suggestive of incalculable resources belonging to 
the power of Rome. A word from distant Caesar in Italy 
summons a navy into existence on the western coast of 
France. The whole work of construction seems to have 



152 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

been accomplished during that part of the winter which re- 
mained after Crassus sent his word to Caesar and Caesar sent 
his orders back in reply. 

With the opening spring, Caesar is on hand himself. It 
seems from what he says that the conscience of the Veneti 
was greatly quickened by his arrival. They began to reflect 
what a " crime " they had committed, in detaining those 
martial mendicants. Caesar even pauses here to enlarge a 
little on the sacredness of the persons of " ambassadors." 
The moral sense of the ancient world might be relied upon 
to go with Caesar, if he should chastise with exemplary se- 
verity a wrong done to ambassadors. But, besides this, 
Caesar has statesmanship enough to know that " revolt " was 
likely to spread. With edifying general reflection on the 
constitution of the human mind, Caesar here says, that "all 
men by nature love liberty and hate the condition of slavery." 
Caesar, at least, knew what Roman conquest meant to the 
nations conquered. In view of every thing, this tireless man 
decided that he must both punish the Veneti, together with 
their allies, and likewise garrison all Gaul — quite, forsooth, 
as if it had not been in the two years preceding sufficiently 
"pacified." ("Pacified" is the harmless-looking quakerly 
word by which the clement soul of Caesar loves best to 
speak of such wasting and depopulating wars as he waged in 
Gaul.) Labienus, Crassus, Titurius, are sent each to a dif- 
ferent quarter of the pacified country, while young Decimus 
Brutus (kinsman of the future chief conspirator, himself also 
destined to be of the number of Caesar's murderers) is placed 
over the fleet, and ordered to go, as soon as possible, to the 
Veneti. The land forces Caesar in person leads thither. 

It is constantly, in the preparation of these volumes, a 
great problem for us to decide in what way we may hope 
best to serve the interests of our readers. For instance, we 
cannot give Caesar entire. But, indeed, we should not wish 
to do so, if we could. The full narrative would be tedious. 



CcEsar. 



*53 



Our text would bristle with strange outlandish names, repellent 
to readers. On the other hand, condensation always threatens 
to squeeze out and lose what juice there is in a story by no 
means over-juicy at its best. To leave out details that need- 
lessly would weary, to introduce precisely the details most 
necessary to instruct and entertain, to condense enough to 
bring within required limits, to be full enough to make a 
fairly adequate exhibition of our author in his matter and his 
manner — this, we must keep it ever in mind, is our aim. 

Well, on the whole, now for a heavy turn in our press, the 
juice meantime to waste if it must. This naval warfare of the 
Romans — men never very natural sailors — with the Veneti — 
men born and bred to the sea — had, notwithstanding so 
much advantage against the invaders, the usual, the inevita- 
ble, issue. The Veneti were beaten on their own element. 
The Romans applied their energy, awkwardly indeed, but 
irresistibly, and won. 

Before engaging in warfare on the water, Caesar had, with 
infinite labor to his men, uselessly captured town after town 
of the enemy, only to see the inhabitants escape with their 
possessions to a farther stronghold which had still to be 
taken with similarly laborious and similarly useless opera- 
tions of siege. Exasperated, no doubt, with the troublesome 
opposition he had encountered in conquering, Csesar was the 
more forward to think, as he says he thought, that the barba- 
rians needed a wholesome lesson about the sacred rights of 
ambassadors. He calmly slaughtered all the national sena- 
tors, and sold the rest of the Veneti for slaves. 

While these things were going on between Caesar and the 
Veneti,Ti-tu'ri-us Sa-bi'nus, one of the lieutenants sent to gar- 
rison pacified Gaul, had an opportunity to show the Gallic 
foe what Romans could do, no less in knavery than in brav- 
ery. (Wait till the fifth book, and see how Titurius himself 
will tragically experience, through knavery, a recompense 

of his knavery.) He bribed a renegade Gaul among his 

<7* 



154 Preparatory Lati?i Course i?i English. 

auxiliaries to carry false news to the patriot insurgents. 
This pretended deserter gets his brethren to attack the 
Roman camp. 

The attacking Gauls are spent with running up hill, they 
are burdened with sticks and brush brought by them to fill 
up the trenches around the Roman camp — and the Romans, 
fully prepared, fresh, expectant, confident, cut them in pieces 
almost to a man. Thus, as Caesar, evidently complacent 
over a coincidence exhibiting his own good fortune, cheer- 
fully remarks, Sabinus heard of Caesar's victory, and Caesar 
of Sabinus's, both at one and the same moment. 

Meantime, young Crassus distinguishes himself. If there 
is any art in Caesar's account of Crassus's achievements, it 
is exquisitely good art, for it almost completely conceals 
itself. By whatever motive on Caesar's part influenced, 
the story is told by Caesar in a way to give his rich 
colleague the utmost possible pleasure in the gallant and 
skillful conduct of his son. The youthful lieutenant had 
been put in charge of revolted Aquitania. With no less 
prudence than firmness, he marched into the territories 
of the most powerful of the Aquitanian tribes. The ene- 
my mass their forces and attack the Romans in march. 
Caesar, with consummate grace of compliment to the father 
through the son, says, that while, on their part, the enemy 
were animated by the thought of all Aquitania's depending 
for its freedom on their valor, the Romans, on their part, 
" desired that it might be seen what they could accomplish, 
without their general and without the other legions, under a 
very young commander." How sweet a proud Roman fa- 
ther must have found it, to chew the cud of such tribute, so 
deftly postponed and concealed, to the virtues and the pop- 
ularity of his son! Under the circumstances described, the 
contest was a long and bloody one. But the inevitable hap- 
pened once more. The Aquitanians gave way, and Crassus 
at once proceeded to besiege their chief town. He brought 



Ccesar. 155 

his vi'ne-ae (movable shelters under which sappers and 
miners could work) and his turrets or towers — he brought 
these military engines to bear, and the town capitulated. 

Enterprising young Crassus is fired with the zeal which 
springs from success. He takes up his line of hostile march 
into the territories of other tribes. The natural and usual 
course of events again. The threatened barbarians sent 
each other ambassadors and combined to repel the common 
enemy. Crassus thought that his true plan was to come at 
once to combat with the constantly increasing force of his 
foe. His officers agreed. 

But the wary Aquitanians preferred the chances of delay. 
They did not accept battle from Crassus. Crassus accord- 
ingly, having waited till the army had become eager enough 
for fighting to fight furiously, let fly his men like dogs at 
their game. It is the old story. Of fifty thousand Aqui- 
tanians scarce a fourth part escape. The tired Romans 
got back late that night to their camp. 

The greater part of Aquitania was, on receiving news of 
this battle, ready to regard itself as " pacified." Eleven 
peoples are named that sent in their hostages to Crassus. 
The young fellow had had a very fine hunting season, and 
bagged a large quantity of game. 

The summer is now well-night spent — the summer, but 
not Caesar. He hears of two Gallic tribes guilty of not send- 
ing in to him their ambassadors. He instantly marches into 
their territory. This thing, he thinks, is now so nearly done, 
it might better be finished up out of hand. He seemed con- 
stitutionally averse to having a trifle of the sort left over for 
a future campaign. 

These contumacious Gallic tribes adopted a new strategy. 
They hid themselves and their effects among morasses and 
forests. Caesar began to fortify a camp, when, out of the 
woods surrounding the place, forth rushed a multitude of 
barbarians and fell upon the Romans unprepared. Unpre- 



156 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

pared, however, the Romans never were. They dropped 
their shovels, and snatched up their swords. They drove 
the barbarians to cover. 

Nothing daunted these Romans. Caesar set his men to 
clearing up the barbarians' country for them. For immense 
spaces the forests were leveled with the ground. But now 
the winter rains came on, and even Romans could not stand 
it longer in their tents. So Caesar, having merely wasted 
the lands and burned the villages and houses of the inhab- 
itants, withdrew into winter-quarters elsewhere. 

And the third book and the third campaign are ended. 

Fourth Book. 

Three things especially, in the fourth book of Caesar's 
Commentaries, are of commanding interest. The first is the 
case of alleged perfidy, with enormous undoubted cruelty, 
practiced by Caesar against his German enemies. The 
second is Caesar's famous feat in throwing a bridge across 
the river Rhine. The third is his invasion of Great Britain. 

Far northward toward the mouth of that river, two more 
tribes of Germans had just crossed the Rhine. They may 
have heard of Ariovistus's fate, and have dreaded the con- 
sequences of their own act in crossing; but what seemed 
worse urged them behind, and they crossed, men, women, 
and children, to the number of near half a million. This 
immense migration could not be permitted. Caesar marched 
against the Germans. 

But Caesar lingers more than usual in describing his en- 
emy. Naming the Su-e'vi in particular, but apparently 
meaning the Germans in general, he makes out his adver- 
saries to be a very wild and savage people. They wear no 
clothes but skins, and these in such scant measure that the 
greater part of their bodies goes bare. They practice, even 
in their severely cold climate, bathing out of doors in the 
rivers. They make milk and flesh their main food. This 



Ccesar. 157 

sort of life promotes among them great size of body. They 
grow up from their childhood without discipline or restraint, 
in the habit of freely following each one his own individual 
inclination. They do not stay more than a single year in the 
same place of residence. There is with them no separate 
ownership of land. Their practice in war is to send out, this 
year, a certain proportion of their men to fight, while the 
rest stay at home to maintain both themselves and the war- 
riors, and next year to let these relays exchange places. They 
will not use saddles, and they despise those who do. They 
often in battle spring to the ground, and, fighting on foot, 
leave their horses, trained to this habit, standing exactly 
where the riders dismounted, to await their return. Wine 
they, like the Nervii, will none of, deeming that drink to be 
hurtful to their powers of endurance. 

Caesar takes, for him, unaccustomed pains to magnify thus 
the formidable character of foes, whom in the sequel he 
will, employing so detestable an expedient, so easily destroy. 
He says that the Suevi, who were, in power, the foremost of 
the Germans, had it for their boast that no nations dared 
live in their neighborhood. They kept the lands lying waste 
and wild for hundreds of miles on their frontier. 

The two tribes (the U-sip'e-tes and the Tenc-te'ri — if you 
will have their names) first alluded to in the present book 
had, for a time, held their own against the encroachments of 
the Suevi. At length dispossessed, they wandered about 
hither and thither in Germany, seeking homes, until they 
found homes by dispossessing in turn the Me-na'pi-i, a tribe 
occupying places on both banks of the Rhine. 

These restless movements of population on the confines 
of the Roman world, no doubt, as we have before said, in- 
dicates a steady pressure of advancing southward immigra- 
tion, starting from sources somewhere in the remote interior 
of Asia, and felt for ages, both before and after Caesar's 
time, along the whole extended northern frontier of the 



158 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

empire. The pressure continued, and grew, until, in the inva- 
sion of the Goths and the Huns, it breached the outer walls 
of Roman civilization and overspread the empire in a tide of 
irruption that submerged the eternal city itself. What Caesar 
did was to stay this importunate stress — for a time. But not 
even Caesar can permanently keep out the sea. To the sea 
there is but One who can say, " Hitherto shalt thou come, but 
no farther: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." And 
Asian population was a sea. He who " made of one blood all 
nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth " — He 
had "determined the times before appointed, and the bounds 
of their habitation." The pre-appointed times determined for 
the influx into southern Europe of emigrant Asia had not 
yet arrived. The bounds of the habitation of those peoples 
were still providentially fixed, for a space, beyond the Rhine. 
Caesar in Gaul was working unconsciously under Divine 
providence. His success was far more certain than he 
knew. 

Caesar was disturbed with fear lest the incoming of the 
Germans should unsettle the allegiance of the Gauls to their 
Roman master. What Caesar feared had in fact already 
begun to happen. Some of the Gallic tribes had sent am- 
bassadors to the Germans, begging them to leave the banks 
of the Rhine and come on into the interior of Gaul. It was 
not Caesar's way to wait for difficulties to grow and thicken 
around him. He liked to be beforehand with adverse cir- 
cumstances. He forthwith set out with his army to find the 
Germans. 

As he came near, ambassadors from the Germans met him, 
desiring terms of peace. But Caesar would make no terms 
with the Germans, as long as they remained in Gaul. There 
was no land there to be given away. However, if they liked 
to do so, they might settle among the U'bi-i. 

The German ambassadors were at a stand. They would 
carry back Caesar's reply. But would Caesar stay where he 



Ccesar. 159 

then was, and give them a day or two in which to go and re- 
turn ? (The two armies were still some days' march apart.) 
Caesar would not consent. He assumed that what the Ger- 
mans wanted was to gain time for recalling their cavalry from 
a distant foraging expedition. 

The Roman army, which the Germans could no more stop 
by entreating, than by entreating they could have stopped 
the circuit of the earth about the sun, had now come to 
within twelve miles of the enemy, when the German ambas- 
sadors returned to Caesar. They begged Caesar to halt. 
The earth kept moving and — so did Caesar. 'Pray, then,' 
besought the ambassadors, 'pray at least send orders in ad- 
vance to the Roman vanguard not to engage in battle ; and 
permit us meantime to send ambassadors to the Ubii. If 
the Ubii will engage under oath with us, we will do any 
thing you say. But let us have a day or two in which to 
negotiate.' 

Caesar avers he was still suspicious of the Germans. How- 
ever, he told them he should not advance more than four 
miles that day, this for the sake of finding water. Let the 
Germans come to him at that point in good numbers, (the 
proviso, in "good numbers" seems significant — was Caesar's 
perfidious purpose already in his mind ?) and he would talk 
with them. Meanwhile Caesar sent orders to his vanguard 
not to fight unless attacked. 

Now follows an incident which it is very difficult to under- 
stand. Caesar says that as soon as the enemy got sight of 
the Roman horse, five thousand strong, the German horse, 
only eight hundred strong, fell upon these and threw them 
into disorder. The Roman cavalry thereupon making a 
stand, the Germans leaped from their steeds, stabbed Caesar's 
horses in the belly, and, overthrowing many of his soldiers, 
put the rest to flight. For the first time in his history, Caesar 
tells the number of his fallen. There were seventy-five, 
among them an illustrious Aquitanian, sacred from having 



160 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

had a grandfather who was once styled " friend " by the Ro- 
man senate. 

What follows in Caesar's narrative is so grave in its illus- 
trative bearing upon Caesar's character, that we are going 
to satisfy the just curiosity of our readers by letting them 
see exactly how the writer states the business for himself. 
Here, then, are Caesar's own words, in sufficiently strict 
translation : 

After this battle, Caesar resolved neither to give audience to their am- 
bassadors, nor admit them to terms of peace, seeing they had treacher- 
ously applied for a truce, and afterward of their own accord broken it. 
He likewise considered that it would be downright madness to delay 
coming to an action until their army should be augmented, and their 
cavalry join them ; and the more so, because he was perfectly well ac- 
quainted with the levity of the Gauls, among whom they had already 
acquired a considerable reputation by this successful attack, and to 
whom it therefore behooved him by no means to allow time to enter into 
measures against him. Upon all these accounts he determined to come 
to an engagement with the enemy as soon as possible, and communi- 
cated his design to his quaestor and lieutenants. A very lucky accident 
fell out to bring about Caesar's purpose, for the day after, in the morn- 
ing, the Germans persisting in their treachery and dissimulation, came 
in great numbers to the camp : all their nobility and princes making 
part of their embassy. Their design was, as they pretended, to vindi- 
cate themselves in regard to what had happened the day before ; because, 
contrary to engagements made and come under at their own request, 
they had fallen upon our men ; but their real motive was to obtain if 
possible another insidious truce. Caesar, overjoyed to have them thus 
in his power, ordered them to be secured, and immediately drew his 
forces out of the camp. The cavalry, whom he supposed terrified with 
the late engagement, were commanded to follow in the rear. 

Having drawn up his army in three lines, and made a very expedi- 
tious march of eight miles, he appeared before the enemy's camp before 
they had the least apprehension of his design. All things conspiring to 
throw them into a sudden consternation, which was not a little increased 
by our unexpected appearance, and the absence of their own officers ; 
and hardly any time left them either to take counsel or fly to arms, they 
were utterly at a loss what course to take, whether to draw out their 
forces and oppose the enemy, or content themselves with defending the 



Ccesar. 161 

camp, or, in fine, to seek for safety in flight. As this fear was evident 
from the tumult and uproar we perceived among them, our soldiers, in- 
stigated by the remembrance of their treacherous behavior the day be- 
fore, broke into the camp. Such as could first provide themselves with 
arms made .a show of resistance and for some time maintained the fight 
amidst the baggage and carriages. But the women and children (for 
the Germans had brought all their families and effects with them over 
the Rhine) betook themselves to flight on all sides. Caesar sent the 
cavalry in pursuit of them. 

The Germans, hearing the noise behind them, and seeing their wives 
and children put to the sword, threw down their arms, abandoned their 
ensigns, and fled out of the camp. Being arrived at the confluence of 
the Rhine and the Meuse, and finding it impossible to continue their 
flight any farther; after a dreadful slaughter of those that pretended 
to make resistance, the rest threw themselves into the river ; where, 
what with fear, weariness, and the force of the current, they almost all 
perished. Thus our army, without the loss of a man, and with very few 
wounded, returned to their camp, having put an end to this formidable 
war in which the number of the enemy amounted to four hundred and 
thirty thousand. Caesar offered those whom he had detained in his 
camp liberty to depart ; but they, dreading the resentment of the Gauls, 
whose lands they had laid waste, chose rather to remain with him, and 
obtained his consent for that purpose. 

Readers will decide, each one for himself, what measure of 
reprobation to visit on the name and memory of Caesar for 
this portentous wholesale murder of men, women, and chil- 
dren, (to a number equaling, conceive it, the entire pop- 
ulation of a great city like Boston,) accomplished through 
such violation of honor on his part. It ought to be observed 
how Caesar, with all his care, very nearly convicts himself of 
falsifying in his representation that he thought the German 
ambassadors were trying to deceive him. For, after destroy- 
ing by hundreds of thousands, men, women, and children 
who certainly were innocent, then, the very ones, and the 
only ones, who were guilty, if any were guilty, namely, the 
ambassadors, he tells us himself he offered to let go ! If one 
could but feel that this offer of Caesar's was the prompting of 
remorse on his part ! Alas, Caesar, as we shall see by and 



1 62 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



by, in connection with a later occasion of his conduct in 
Gaul — Caesar was far too conscious of clemency in himself 
to be capable of a gracious remorse ! Not even Mr. Froude 
clears Caesar here; and Caesar's fellow- senator, Cato, (accord- 
ing to Plutarch, who cites his authority for the statement,) 
openly proposed in the Roman senate that Caesar should be 
given up to the enemy in punishment of his crime. This 
proposal of Cato's was somewhat like the mice's proposal to 
put a bell on the cat in order that thenceforward their ex- 
posed community might upon occasion be seasonably ap- 
prised of their enemy's approach. It was, perhaps, in 
either case, an excellent proposal ; but there was no mouse 
found to put the bell on the cat, and there was nobody at 
Rome or elsewhere to deliver Caesar to the Germans. 

Perfidy, Caesar's detention of the German envoys has gen- 
erally been called. There is, perhaps, no better name for 
his crime. The engagement, however, which he broke, was 
simply the implied engagement always existing toward am- 
bassadors. Such implied engagement, Caesar, as we have 
seen, when it suited him, insisted upon with much solem- 
nity. To us moderns, heirs of near twenty Christian cent- 
uries, the cold-bloodedness of Caesar's behavior in setting 
his dastard cavalry to riding down women and children, 
and trampling them, by tens of thousands, into the bloody 
dust, seems simply incredible. But Caesar did the thing, for 
he tells us of it himself. Having once done it, there was 
no alternative for Caesar, he must then tell of it. Too many 
Roman eyes saw the deed, for the deed to remain secret 
from Rome. It behooved Caesar to put the best face upon 
the matter that he could. And this, we need not doubt, he 
has done. It is a fearful judgment — in its nature quite ir- 
reversible, indeed beyond any appeal — that Caesar has thus 
passed upon himself before the bar of posterity. But let us 
not forget — there was, in the mere cruelty of this deed of 
his, nothing to make Caesar, in the presence of the public 



Ccesar. 163 

sentiment of his time, feel in the least ashamed. It was only 
the bad faith, the treachery, of his deed, that was doubtful. 
Cato said Caesar was false. Nobody, so far as we know, said 
Caesar was cruel. 

Mr. Long, we believe it is, in his " Decline of the Roman 
Republic," who points out that Christian civilization has no 
very clear case for vaunting itself, as ideally humane in war, 
above the example of the Romans and of Caesar. He records, 
with disagreeable pertinency of recollection, instances of 
barbarous military practice, on the part of the English them- 
selves of the nineteenth century; and then, as if to make us 
Americans, too, dumb with conscious shame, he brings for- 
ward our national crimes of atrocity toward the Indians, per- 
petrated in very recent times. Can we not all of us remem- 
ber when our own gallant soldiers in the West murdered 
Indian men, women, and children, and called it war ? The 
difference, indeed, is great ; for the American nation at large 
burned with indignant remorse. 

We have ourselves claimed that Caesar was seldom, if ever, 
wantonly cruel. And that massacre of the Germans was not 
wanton cruelty on his part. He wished to have those peo- 
ple annihilated. The way that he took was the one sure 
way of annihilating them. To have fought them fairly, 
would have been to take upon himself the always doubtful 
risks of war. And in his heart, Caesar, as the present writer 
judges from Caesar himself, was afraid of the Germans. His 
crossing of the Rhine, now next to be described, was an act 
of bravado on his part — in its circumstances, exhibiting 
fear, the fear of a brave, wise man, rather than confidence. 

Caesar had effectually dispelled the present danger. 
While the terror and horror of such an atrocity was still be- 
numbing men's minds, he could safely display his skill and 
his daring in a feat well calculated to impress barbarian sen- 
sibilities with a useful idea of Roman power. He would do 
what no Roman had ever yet done, he would bridge the 



164 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Rhine and cross it. It was to be barren demonstration, so 
far as any thing beyond impression on the imagination was 
concerned.. For he would recross almost immediately. 
"Avidity of fame," Plutarch attributes as Caesar's motive, in 
this action of his. He wished to be the first Roman to put 
his head in the lion's mouth by invading Germany. He 
crossed and he recrossed the Rhine, and he had his reward. 

Caesar's bridge was fourteen hundred feet long, furnishing 
a solid roadway thirty or forty feet wide, all finished promptly 
enough to have the whole army got in safety across — at least 
with no casualty reported — within ten days from the time 
when the first blow of a Roman axe startled those distant 
forests. Just where it was situated, is a matter of much dis- 
pute. When, in your next European tour, you visit Bonn, 
placed as that city is about where the Rhine first begins to 
be picturesque enough to satisfy the eye of the traveler for 
pleasure, take an observation of the locality and see if you 
do not think the conditions go together very well in favor of 
the neighborhood of Bonn as the probable site of Caesar's 
rough-and-ready bridge. Cologne used to be the favorite 
locality with learned students of Caesar; but the late Empe- 
ror Napoleon, who spent a good deal of time and money in 
illustrating Caesar's Gallic campaigns, gave his vote for Bonn 
instead of Cologne. 

Caesar now turns his attention to another enterprise, that 
of invading Great Britain. He begins prudently. He dis- 
patches one Caius Vol'u-se'nus with a single ship of war, to 
cross the channel, cruise about the British coast, and bring 
back such fruits of observation as he may be able to obtain 
without landing. While this is going on, the accustomed 
flow of ambassadors sets in toward Caesar — this time from 
Britain. Certain " states " of the island offer hostages and 
submit to the Roman power. Caesar hereupon assumes 
something of the air of a gracious sovereign about to visit 
his affectionate lieges. 



Ccesar. 165 

There were many preparations very necessary for Caesar 
to make, which are not at all necessary for us here to re- 
count. Suffice it to say, that in due time the flotilla is 
ready, and a few hours' sail brings Caesar to the British 
coast. The cliffs are alive with islanders, prepared to re- 
ceive their visitor with warlike welcome. 

The Britons are alert, and they dash along the coast, with 
horsemen and with chariots of war, to meet the invasion where 
it threatened. The Romans have a sad time of it getting 
ashore. Caesar notes it that his soldiers seemed not to take 
their chance of floundering through the shoal water to land, 
with any thing like their wonted appetite for fighting on dry 
ground. He made a display of his vessels under motion, 
with their military engines in view, which demonstration he 
says produced some impression of awe on the barbarians. 
Here occurs a little incident which Caesar, with a for him 
quite unusual condescension to dramatic representation, re- 
lates in what grammarians call (oratio recta) direct discourse. 
Our readers must have this rare specimen of Caesar in the 
lively mood, without change — except the necessary change 
of literal translation from Latin into English : 

While our men were hesitating chiefly on account of the depth 
of the sea, he who carried the eagle of the tenth legion, after sup- 
plicating the gods, that the matter might turn out favorably to the 
legion, exclaimed, "Leap, fellow-soldiers, unless you wish to betray 
your eagle to the enemy. I, for my part, will perform my duty to the 
commonwealth and my general." When he had said this with a loud 
voice, he leaped from the ship and proceeded to bear the eagle toward 
the enemy. Then our men, exhorting one another that so great a dis- 
grace should not be incurred, all leaped from the ship. When those in 
the nearest vessels saw them, they speedily followed and approached the 
enemy. 

(To say, ' cried out to his fellow-soldiers, bidding them 
leap,' etc., would have been (oratio obliqua) indirect dis- 
course, Caesar's wonted form of construction.) 

We hardly need follow with further detail the incidents of 



1 66 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

this British adventure of Caesar. The historian tries to give 
the affair something like historic dignity. The truth, how- 
ever, is that Caesar's first visit to Great Britain was by no 
means a very glorious thing. He is compelled himself to 
admit that his usual good fortune failed him in one impor- 
tant particular — his cavalry had not arrived, and he could not 
pursue the enemy. The enemy had an extremely light way 
of dealing with the Romans. They made peace by sur- 
render, and by promise of hostages, and then, watching their 
chance, they, with easy adjustment to circumstances, made 
war again when the Romans seemed to be in extremity. 
Altogether, Caesar, as narrator, has his match to make out 
any thing beyond the story of a fairly successful escape, on 
his part, from the dangers of an ostentatious and barren ex- 
cursion to Great Britain. What with the fickle, but always 
warlike, Britons careering around among the Roman ranks 
with their chariots of war, the unexpectedly high tides 
swamping the beached galleys of the invaders on the land, 
the furious storms crushing their floating vessels one against 
another on the water, the wretched trouble the honest 
legionaries had of it reaping for themselves in the British 
harvest-fields, under the weapons of the rightful owners of the 
harvests — Caesar did well that he got off from Great Britain 
at all. He had a thanksgiving of twenty days decreed to 
him for the success of the campaign. 

We will venture to guess that there were moments of 
emergency to Caesar in Great Britain, when he would gladly 
have relinquished several days out of the glorious twenty, to 
be perfectly certain that he should himself at last get back 
to Rome with a whole skin. 

What would Caesar have said, had it been revealed to him 
that the time was coming when Britons could set out from 
London in a palace on wheels, and ride, reading, feasting, or 
sleeping at pleasure, like kings, the whole distance to Rome, 
accomplishing the journey with more comfort than Caesar 



Ccesar. 167 

himself perhaps enjoyed in his own princely dwelling at 
home, all within the space of fifty-three hours ! Such is the 
miracle of locomotion achieved in our days. 

Fifth Book. 

We have already in the preceding pages gone over, with a 
fair degree of fullness, that portion of Caesar's Gallic Com- 
mentaries which, to the student aiming at preparation for 
entering college, is usually prescribed for his reading in the 
original Latin. Gallic Commentaries, observe, we say. For 
besides the Gallic Commentaries there are commentaries of 
Caesar concerning the civil war waged between himself and 
Pompey. This last book contains very interesting and very 
important history. But Caesar's commentaries on the civil 
war are. seldom or never read in the so-styled Preparatory 
Course. That work, therefore, of Caesar's we here dismiss 
with the mere mention of it thus already made. 

We beg to call our reader's attention to a fact that will 
interest them. You are now engaged in studying history, 
almost, not quite, at first hand. You are not reading ex- 
actly Caesar's own words, for you read in English, not in 
Latin ; and besides, you take, in large part, the present 
writer's redaction or interpretation of Caesar upon trust. 
Those, however, who read the Latin itself of Caesar's Com- 
mentaries, enjoy, in doing so, what is a very rare privilege, 
the privilege of reading history written, in nearly every part 
of it, by an exceptionally well-situated eye-witness of the 
transactions described. 

Very little of the history that we have in any language 
bears this character. Nearly all the history of the world is 
given to us by authors who, for their information, have been 
obliged to rely upon testimony. The testimony relied upon 
is in many cases somewhat remote, and not unfrequently it 
reaches the historian transmitted indirectly through several 
different hands. History accordingly is a sphere of study 



1 68 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

in which there is room for the exercise of much critical dis- 
crimination, in the giving and refusing of credit. When we 
read Caesar telling of things that he saw, and the chief part 
of which he himself was, we may rest assured that we have 
no occasion for being distrustful, at least on the score of de- 
fective opportunity enjoyed by the historian. What hap- 
pened within the range of his narrative, Caesar knew. More 
than this. Caesar, as we suppose, wrote his Commentaries on 
the spot and at the time. He did not wait long enough be- 
fore writing to remember wrong when he wrote. Thus all 
we have to guard against in reading Caesar, is conscious and 
intentional misrepresentation on his part. But the tone of 
his writing is such that, in the main, our belief of what he 
says is irresistibly compelled. We may,, at any rate, re- 
ceive undoubtingly whatever he tells us that makes against 
himself. 

So much by way of suggestive general remark on canons 
of criticism for history. We may illustrate the difference 
between first-hand and second-hand history by a relevant in- 
stance. Let it be supplied from Caesar himself collated with 
Plutarch. Plutarch is a charming biographical gossiper. 
He will always continue to be read, though, with enlightened 
readers, he long ago ceased to be implicitly trusted. You 
feel kindly toward a writer who entertains you so well, and 
you are sufficiently sure, that, however careless in his state- 
ments, Plutarch must at least have had excellent intentions. 

Plutarch says, referring to the immediately precedent 
circumstances of that dark incident in the great Roman's 
career, as to which he was accused by Cato of perfidy toward 
the Germans: 

" With only eight hundred horse, who were not prepared 
for an engagement, he, Caesar, beat their cavalry which con- 
sisted of five thousand." 

Our readers will remember what Caesar really relates. 
Plutarch gets it quite accurately wrong. It was the Roman 



Ccesar. 169 



horse, not the German, that numbered five thousand. And 
it was the German horse, not the Roman, that numbered 
eight hundred. As to the event of the action, Plutarch is of 
course both right and wrong. He is right in assigning the 
victory to the smaller force. But he is wrong in assigning 
the victory to the Romans. The explanation probably is, 
that Plutarch read Caesar rapidly to-day, and wrote carelessly 
from memory day after to-morrow. Our readers will see 
why historical critics give small weight to Plutarch's unsup- 
ported testimony. If he errs so in a matter as to which we 
may test his accuracy, how can we trust him in matters as to 
which we have no information but his own ? Does some 
reader' question with himself: But, perhaps, Plutarch, as to 
this incident in Caesar's German campaign, had some source 
of information other than Caesar, of which our present author, 
mistaken though well-meaning no doubt, does not know ? 
Well questioned, dear reader. You ought not to follow your 
guide too implicitly. It is always wise to cherish some safe- 
guard doubts of your own respecting the infallibility of any 
author you read. However, in the particular instance before 
us, it happens that Plutarch expressly gives Caesar's Com- 
mentaries for his authority. These are his words : " The 
account of the affair with them, [the two German tribes,] we 
shall take from Caesar's own Commentaries." Plutarch took 
pains to be interesting, but he did not take pains to be 
exact. 

The fifth book of Caesar's Commentaries sees the tables 
sharply turned on the Romans. This whole book is mainly 
one unbroken record of disaster to Caesar's arms, disaster 
retrieved, but barely retrieved, from being irreparable dis- 
aster. It would, perhaps, be a certain hard relief to our 
readers' sympathies, so long almost exclusively engaged on 
the side of the barbarians as the weaker and the more 
suffering of the two parties at war — it might, we say, take a 
weight off the depressed feelings of our readers, if they 
8 



170 Preparatory Latin Course in E?iglish. 

could dwell in some detail on the heavy compensating mis- 
fortunes experienced now in their turn by the Romans. But 
this the requirements of space forbid. We must be rapid 
and short. We can promise, however, to be fairly enter- 
taining. That the matter itself will insure. 

There is an episode to begin with — the episode of a second 
and last expedition, on Caesar's part, to Great Britain. With- 
out much more effort, that is permitted to appear in his 
story, than the mere word of command from his mouth, 
Caesar gets together a fleet of some eight hundred sail all 
told — there are reckoned into this total a number of private 
bottoms, probably ventures in merchant speculation — and 
with this numerically formidable armada he reaches the 
coast of Great Britain. The commander goes attended with 
a numerous staff. For Caesar compels (Mr. Froude says 
" requests ") the chiefs of Gaul, with their retinue, to accom- 
pany him on his British expedition, as a kind of cavalry 
escort. 

Our old friend Dumnorix, the ^Eduan patriot, does not 
like the idea of taking this trip with Caesar. He objects in 
every way possible, and Caesar in every way possible insists. 
Caesar of course prevails. That is, he supposes he prevails. 
But in fact Dumnorix, without the knowledge of Caesar, 
slips off for home with the ^Eduan horse. This never would 
do. Caesar wanted all the Gallic chiefs with him, but es- 
pecially Dumnorix. As companions of his on the voyage, 
the*y would be virtual hostages for their own good behavior, 
and for the good behavior of their nations, during the period 
of his absence from Gaul. Dumnorix — nobody could be 
hostage for him — nobody but Dumnorix himself. Dumnorix 
at least could in no wise be spared. On the very eve of em- 
barkation, Caesar gives over his voyage, till Dumnorix be 
taken. He is taken, but he is not taken alive. He falls, 
stoutly resisting, and calling on his countrymen to support 
him. Again and again, with vain protestation, he exclaimed, 



Cczsar. 171 

"lam a free man, and I belong to a free state." (The 
^Eduan territory had, in fact, not been reduced to a province 
of Rome.) Farewell to Dumnorix ! 

There is nothing now, this business being well dispatched, 
to detain Caesar, and he sets sail as we have said. Having 
landed and encamped, he encounters once more a former 
enemy of his — a British storm. His ships are badly shat- 
tered. But what can withstand Caesar? He speaks a word, 
and his ships are tugged and lugged with main strength on 
shore, and there fortified within the same lines as his camp. 
This operation took about ten days and nights, for the men 
worked continuously — in relays, let us trust — all the twenty- 
four hours through. 

We pass over a bit of British geography by Caesar, to tell 
briefly what happened in the way of warlike operations. The 
Romans have active work of it fighting with the poor islanders. 
Cas'si-ve-lau'nus is the name of the British leader. He 
adopts a kind of guerrilla plan of operations. When the 
Roman cavalry rode forth to "plunder and ravage" — honest 
industries, which Caesar mentions with the most business-like, 
matter-of-course calmness — the British charioteers would 
rush out of the skirting woods, and sadly interfere with their 
foreign visitors' work. Nothing, by the way, is said by 
Caesar of those British war-chariots' being armed at the 
wheels with scythes. The scythe-bearing chariots of the 
ancient Britons, of which we have all heard so much, are 
probably a myth. Caesar would certainly have mentioned 
the scythes, if scythes there had been. 

Of attack and repulse, of retreat and pursuit, of slaughter 
and capture, of embassy and reply, of surrender proposed 
and hostages demanded, of all the vicissitudes of this wanton 
and gratuitous war, the upshot is that Caesar gets off at last 
in safety, and, as he represents it, even in a certain barren 
and ambiguous triumph. The account closes with a passage 
worth our quoting. Caesar covers the emptiness of his mili- 



172 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

tary performance in Britain with a rhetorical flourish about 
his own good fortune. This is a topic on which he never 
tires of enlarging. It is not mere curiosity on his own part 
that prompts the treatment of this topic, nor is it a good- 
natured wish to gratify the curiosity of his readers. It is a 
motive of thrift. Prosperity prospers. Caesar wants every 
body to understand that Caesar is prosperous. Here, then, is 
the passage, in which Caesar thinks it comportable with his 
dignity to dismiss the story of his adventures in Britain : 

And it so happened, that out of so large a number of ships, in so many 
voyages, neither in this nor in the previous year was any ship missing 
which conveyed soldiers ; but very few out of those which were sent 
back to him from the continent empty, as the soldiers of the former 
convoy had been disembarked, and out of those (sixty in number) which 
Labienus had taken care to have built, reached their destination ; al- 
most all the rest were driven back, and when Csesar had waited for them 
for some time in vain, lest he should be deterred from a voyage by the 
season of the year, inasmuch as the equinox was at hand, he of necessity 
stowed his soldiers the more closely, and, a very great calm coming on, 
after he had weighed anchor at the beginning of the second watch, he 
reached land at break of day and brought in all the ships in safety. 

Returned to Gaul, Caesar found that the harvests there, on 
account of droughts, were poor. He felt compelled, accord- 
ingly, to depart from his prudent previous practice, and for 
that winter distribute his legions. This seemed to offer to 
the natives their chance. There was a general movement 
commenced to fall on all the Roman camps simultaneously, 
and overpower them one by one. Am-bi'o-rix, a crafty native 
chief, practices successfully on the simplicity of a lieutenant 
of Caesar who had no right to be simple. It was none other 
than our old acquaintance, Titurius Sabinus, the author of 
that deception which, our readers will remember, in the 
third book, brought such calamity on the Gauls. Ambiorix 
induces Titurius to forsake his winter-quarters, for the pur- 
pose (proposed to him by his enemy) of seeking greater 
safety by joining the Roman legion nearest his present posi* 



Ccesar. 173 

tion. On the way, an ambuscade surprises the Roman force ; 
and, notwithstanding the address and courage of Titurius's 
colleague, Cotta, who had throughout opposed the movement 
to retire, the Romans were all cut in pieces, save a remnant 
who fell back into the just-forsaken camp. The standard- 
bearer, overpowered — Caesar gives his name — with last, des- 
perate, unconquerable strength flings his eagle before him 
within the intrenchments, where, during the hopeless night 
that followed, the proud Romans all to a man put an end 
to their own lives. The destruction of the legion was sub- 
stantially complete. Some stragglers only escaped to tell 
the tale to Labienus. 

The great orator Cicero has a brother, Quintus Cicero, 
among Caesar's lieutenants. This officer was next attacked 
by the Gauls. Caesar represents his lieutenant Cicero's con- 
duct as every thing that could have been desired by his illus- 
trious brother in the capital. 

The annihilated Nervii, of whom Caesar told us in the sec- 
ond book of his Commentaries, re-appear unaccountably here, 
and, it would seem, for an annihilated nation, in very con- 
siderable force. Here is what Caesar tells us of them and of 
their work. How much, think you, did eagerness for revenge 
stimulate these brave, fierce fellows in their incredible toils ? 

The Nervians . . . surrounded the camp with a line, whose rampart 
was eleven feet high, and ditch fifteen feet deep. They had learned 
something of this in former wars with Caesar, and the prisoners they had 
made gave them further instructions. But being unprovided with the 
tools necessary in this kind of service, they were obliged to cut the turf 
with their swords, dig up the earth with their hands, and carry it in their 
cloaks. And hence it will be easy to form some judgment of their num- 
ber ; for in less than three hours they completed a line of fifteen miles in 
circuit. The following days were employed in raising towers, propor- 
tioned to the height of our rampart, and in preparing scythes, and 
wooden galleries, in which they were again assisted by the prisoners, 

In near sequel to this comes an episode so very romantic, 
and so far outside of the limits within which Caesar usually 



174 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

confines his narration, that our readers will like to have seen 
it in the translated text of the original : 

In this legion were two centurions of distinguished valor, T. Pul'fi-o 
and L. Va-re'nus, who stood fair for being raised to the first rank of their 
order. These were perpetually disputing with one another the pre- 
eminence in courage, and at every year's promotion contended with 
great eagerness for precedence. In the heat of the attack before the 
ramparts, Pulfio addressing Varenus, " What hinders you now, (says he,) 
or what more glorious opportunity would you desire of signalizing your 
bravery? This, this is the day for determining the controversy 
between us." At these words he sallied out of the camp, and rushed 
amid the thickest of the Gauls. Nor did Varenus decline the challenge ; 
but, thinking his honor at stake, followed at some distance. Pulfio 
darted his javelin at the enemy, and transfixed a Gaul that was coming 
forward to engage him ; who, falling dead of the wound, the multitude 
advanced to cover him with their shields, and all poured their darts 
upon Pulfio, giving him no time to retire. A javelin pierced his shield 
and stuck fast in his belt. This accident, entangling his right hand, 
prevented him from drawing his sword, and gave the enemy time to 
surround him. Varenus, his rival, flew to his assistance, and endeavored 
to rescue him. Immediately the multitude, quitting Pulfio, as fancying 
the dart had dispatched him, all turned upon Varenus. He met them 
with his sword drawn, charged them hand to hand, and having laid one 
dead at his feet, drove back the rest; but, pursuing with too much 
eagerness, stepped into a hole, and fell down. Pulfio, in his turn, hast- 
ened to extricate him ; and both together, after having slain a multitude 
of the Gauls, and acquired infinite applause, retired unhurt within the 
intrenchments. Thus fortune gave such a turn to the dispute that each 
owed his life to his adversary ; nor was it possible to decide to which of 
them the prize of valor was due. 

The situation, meantime, became daily more critical for 
distressed Cicero. But he was relieved at last by the com- 
ing of Caesar. It was an occasion in some features like 
Havelock's famous relief of Lucknow. Cicero despatched to 
Caesar messenger after messenger with news of his piteous 
plight. Of these messengers, some were seized by the en- 
emy and tortured to death in the sight of the Romans. At 
last a Nervian in Cicero's quarters got a Gallic slave of his 



Ccesar. 175 



to risk his life for his freedom, with riches, in an attempt 
to communicate with Caesar. This Gaul reached Caesar in 
safety. Let us hope that he duly received his promised 
reward. 

Caesar at once takes his measures. He speeds to Cicero a 
return messenger, whom he bids, if unable to enter the en- 
closure, throw in his spear with the letter tied to it. This 
the messenger did, and it so happened that the spear stuck 
in a tower, where it remained for two days not observed. 
The third day Cicero got it, and read to the rejoicing legion- 
aries Caesar's promise of speedy relief. About the same mo- 
ment, smoke of fires seen in the distance announced to the 
beleaguered Romans the actual approach of Caesar. The 
final result was decisive victory for the Romans. 

The chief peril was now past, but the winter kept bringing 
fresh anxieties to Caesar, who had this time to forego his ac- 
customed annual visit to Italy. 

The fifth book closes without mention made of any thanks-, 
giving decreed at Rome for Caesar's successes, and Caesar has 
no concluding paragraph in self-complacent celebration of 
his own good fortune. 

Sixth Book. 

Caesar resolved to show the Gauls how Romans behaved 
themselves in the presence of reverses to their arms. He 
made a new levy of troops; the cohorts lost under Titurius, 
he replaced with a double number of soldiers, and he bor- 
rowed a legion from his fellow-triumvir, Pompey. Thus 
strengthened in force, Caesar further strengthened himself 
with speed ; for he began his new campaign before the win- 
ter was over. Observing that in the customary annual con- 
gress of Gaul, summoned by him, the Sen'o-nes failed to 
appear, Csesar, with prompt audacity, at once transfers the 
place of meeting to their neighborhood. He goes to Paris, 
(Lu-te'tia Par-is-i-o'rum.) How modern and how real this 
name makes the history seem ! From Paris, with those 



176 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

forced marches of his which so often accomplished so much 
for his cause, he brings his legions into the country of the 
Senones. Acco, the head of the revolt, calls on the Senones 
to muster into their towns. But the sudden apparition of 
the Romans overawes them, and they send in their sur- 
render. Caesar accepts their submission — for the sake of 
his friends, the ^Eduans, to whom he hands over for safe 
keeping the hundred hostages exacted. It will turn out 
to have been a confidence ill placed. In the end, even the 
trusted ^Eduans will rise against Caesar. 

Caesar never, perhaps, in any other instance, evinced so 
much personal feeling to ripple the habitual viscid flux of 
his glacial cold-bloodedness, as in the instance of Ambiorix, 
that subtle deceiver and destroyer of Titurius with his legion. 
With noticeable energy of expression, Caesar remarks that, 
the Senones disposed of, he " applied himself entirely, both 
in mind and in soul, to the war with the Trev'i-ri and Am- 
biorix." It might be said that to make an end of Ambiorix 
the campaign is chiefly directed. It seems not so much 
victory as revenge that Caesar seeks. He fairly thirsts for 
Ambiorix's blood. Caesar will die thirsting, for Ambiorix's 
blood he is destined never to taste. But it was a hot and 
eager hunt, with many a slip 'twixt cup and lip for the hunter, 
and many a hair-breadth escape for the hunted. Caesar's 
good fortune was at fault again. 

Caesar hunted with as much of patience and of prudence 
as of zeal. He first went at the Me-na'pi-i and the Treviri, 
and disposed of them. 

But now Ambiorix might find refuge among the Germans. 
Caesar must bridge the Rhine again, and provide against that. 
The Suevi have, he learns on getting over, retired to the far- 
ther boundary of their possessions, there to await the on-com- 
ing of the Romans. With this space between himself and 
his foe, Caesar pauses to amuse his readers with a circum- 
stantial account of the Germans and the Gauls, described in 



Ccesar. 177 

mutual contrast . with each other. Almost every body likes 
to read travelers' stories ; and when the traveler is Caius 
Julius Caesar, and the scene of the travels is ancient France 
and Germany, the story is likely to be worth reading. Still, 
the inexorable laws of space forbid our including it here. 

From his geographical digression, Caesar gets back to say 
that he resolved not to follow the Suevi into their forests. 
Not, however, entirely to free the Germans from uncertain 
apprehension as to what he may yet do, he leaves a large 
part of his bridge standing. He now himself in person sets 
forth in chase of Ambiorix. His march lay through the 
Gallic forest of Ar-du-en'na. (Our readers will recall Byron's 
stanza in memory by anticipation of those destined to fall on 
the field of Waterloo, beginning 

And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves. 

Byron was a poet, not a topographer. He was nearly enough 
right, but you must not rely too literally on the locality he 
thus seems to give to the forest. What he wanted was the 
romantic name, Ardennes, to grace the pathos of his verse.) 

But Caesar's phlegm was too much quickened. He could 
not wait. He sent on the cavalry in advance, " all the cav- 
alry," to surprise Ambiorix, if possible. The cavalry are not 
to build camp-fires. The enemy would see them. They 
must take their rations cold, perhaps raw; bare grain, very 
likely, which they must champ like their steeds. The cav- 
alry surpass themselves in speed. They surprise and capt- 
ure "many in the field" — many, but not Ambiorix. Caesar 
has to moralize about " fortune." The cavalry came fairly 
upon Ambiorix. They got every thing that belonged to him, 
his horses, his chariots, his weapons, but him not. A few fol- 
lowers of his made a momentary stand against the Roman 
onset. They meantime mounted Ambiorix, and he escaped. 

But Ambiorix's people had a lamentable lot. They were 
dispersed in every direction, each man looking out for himself. 
8* 



178 Preparatory Lathi Course in English. 

Ambiorix's colleague, King Cat-i-vol'cus, infirm and old, 
called down every curse on Ambiorix and poisoned himself. 
Caesar's purpose was fell. He wished to root out that " stock 
of wicked men." In order not to risk precious Roman sol- 
diers in the forests, he called in the neighboring tribes to the 
hunt, making Ambiorix's nation, the Eburones, a free and 
common prey to all. It was better economy, Caesar thought, 
to throw away Gallic lives than Roman, in so dangerous a 
chase. But at some rate, " the stock and name of the state " 
must "for such a crime be abolished." Again Caesar feels 
called upon to speak of the powerful influence exercised in 
war by fortune. His promising plan for the extermination 
of the Eburones comes near costing him a lieutenant and a 
legion. 

For, from even beyond the Rhine, who should hear of this 
fine free hunt in progress, and come forward for their share 
of the booty, but the Sicambri ? (Sicambrians perhaps we 
should say, to be English. But Shakespeare says " Nervii," 
not Nervians. There seems to be no practicable way of 
being uniform in this matter, except to be uniformly Latin. 
Some of the proper names have acquired for themselves no 
established English equivalent — Remi, Bellovaci, for exam- 
ples. We preferred, upon the whole, to do as we have done, 
that is, use our readers gradually to the Latin forms, by em- 
ploying these in occasional free interchange with the En- 
glish.) These freebooters, the Sicambri, however, have it 
whispered to them that there is a richer chance. What 
need prevent their surprising and taking Quintus Cicero with 
his command? The prize would be immense. Cicero, by 
order from Caesar, is keeping his soldiers very close within 
the intrenchments. At length, however, a party of the re- 
covered sick and wounded, with a large retinue of slaves and 
beasts of burden, make a sally for foraging. At this very 
moment, up come the Germans and throw the camp into 
panic confusion. This is the self-same spot on which Titu- 



CcBsar. 179 

rius and his* legion were destroyed. The soldiers think it a 
doomed place. It is now that our friend, Publius Sextius 
Baculus, springing up from a sick bed, faint with a five-days' 
fast, performs his prodigy of will and valor and saves the 
camp. The foraging party suffer loss, but some even of 
these get back safe to camp. Not till Csesar arrives do the 
soldiers recover from their fright. It affected Caesar sadly 
to reflect how what he had plotted well for the injury of 
Ambiorix had thus turned out actually to the advantage of 
that detestable man. 

However, the hunt was resumed. Thorough work Caesar 
made of it. His plan was nothing less than to remove every 
cover that could hide the fugitive. Far and wide the horse- 
men rode to burn every human dwelling in the land of the 
Eburones. The soldiers, many of them, kindled with the 
hope of acquiring the highest favor with Caesar, almost killed 
themselves, he tells us, with their exertions to catch Am- 
biorix. They again and again just missed him, but he 
finally never was caught. Caesar had to content himself, as 
best he could, without his Ambiorix. 

He closes his sixth book with mention of several matters 
dispatched by him before his setting out for Italy. Among 
these was the execution of Acco, the head of the late con- 
federate revolt. Our readers will perhaps be interested to 
know how this was accomplished. Well, to use Caesar's own 
soft phrase, Acco was put to death "in accordance with the 
custom of the fathers." This meant, if we may trust the ex- 
planation supplied by Suetonius in his " Life of Nero," that, 
stripped naked, the victim was fastened by the neck in a 
forked stake, and then scourged till he died. With much 
justness of sentiment, Caesar hints in passing that this sen- 
tence of his on Acco was "rather sharp." We can only 
guess what would have happened to Ambiorix had he been 
captured. Perhaps, indeed, Acco suffered a little vicariously, 
to satisfy the exasperated feelings of Caesar disappointed of 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



his prey in the person of hateful Ambiorix, hunted by him so 
long in vain. 

Seventh Book. 

The seventh book is of tragic interest. One man looms 
large in it, as the doomed Hector of a contest in which no 
one can stand before the prowess of mighty Achilles. Ver- 
cin-get'o-rix is this hero's name. He becomes the head of a 
last, the greatest, confederate revolt of Gaul against Rome. 
He was a young Arvernian, (Auvergne,) son of a man as to 
whom Caesar, in language curiously applicable to his own 
impending fate, says, " Having held the supremacy of entire 
Gaul, he had been put to death by his fellow-citizens for 
this reason, because he aimed at sovereign power." 

This able and gallant chieftain thought that Caesar's neces- 
sities in Rome — the city was at this moment the scene of 
civil broils — would keep him there, and that now was the 
one chance to strike for his own oppressed country. He or- 
ganizes the most formidable combination hostile to Caesar 
that has yet confronted that conqueror in Gaul. 

Caesar, as usual, gets the start. He begins his campaign 
in midwinter. Clearing his way through snow six feet deep, 
" with infinite labor to his soldiers," as, with a touch of almost 
sympathetic appreciation rare for him, he remarks, he reaches 
the country of the Arverni, the people of Vercingetorix him- 
self. (Caesar believes in taking the bull by the horn.) This 
proceeding has the desired effect. It brings Vercingetorix 
home. 

Now, with Vercingetorix at home for a space, Caesar can 
execute one of his rapid movements. With marches not in- 
termitted day or night, he goes through the ^Eduan territory 
into the country of the Lingones, where two legions are win- 
tering. If his trusty friends, the ^Eduans — Caesar himself 
says this — should be devising any thing to his own disadvan- 
tage, it would be well to forestall their plans ! He sends out 
a mustering summons to the rest of his legions. The Ar- 



Ccesar. 1 8 1 

verni meantime are fully occupied with attention to the Ro- 
man cavalry raids going on in their own country from the force 
left behind. Before the Arverni, thus occupied, hear a whis- 
per of what he is doing, he has his whole army safely com- 
pacted. Vercingetorix, when he does learn of Caesar's pro- 
ceedings, prepares to attack a town of the Boi'i, lately made 
tributary by Caesar to the yEduans. This greatly perplexes 
Caesar. But he feels that at every risk he must take care of 
his friends, or he may come to have no friends to be taken 
care of — and in turn to take care of him. So he marches to 
the Boii. 

On the way he takes two towns, sacking one of them and 
giving the booty to his soldiers. A third town surrenders 
itself to Caesar. Vercingetorix now gets the confederates to 
adopt the policy of wasting their own country so as to starve 
the Romans out. One city, proud of itself, and strong by 
natural situation, is excepted — against the remonstrance of 
Vercingetorix, who, however, finally concedes the point. 
The hope of the confederates is that this city can make 
good its own defense against the Romans. 

The Romans are reduced to extremity for want of pro- 
visions. The Boii are poor and the ^Eduans are lukewarm. 
For several days the soldiers are without grain ; but they 
do not once murmur. So the siege of the one spared con- 
federate town goes on. Vercingetorix, as he finds oppor- 
tunity, creates diversions in relief of the besieged. But dis- 
affection toward him is bred among the allied forces. Ac- 
cused of treason, he makes a successful defense of himself. 

'I want nothing,' said he, 'from Csesar through treachery, I, 
who can gain from Caesar all I desire by victory.' With fine 
dramatic effect, he produces a number of starved fellows — 
who, Caesar says, were mere camp-followers of the Romans, 
captured when foraging — and makes these do for specimens 
of Caesar's legionary soldiers. ' Such,' says Vercingetorix, 

'is the condition to which the Romans are now reduced. 



1S2 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

This is what traitor Vercingetorix has effected for you.' 
The whole tumultuary assembly clash their arms in applause, 
and cry, ' Long live Vercingetorix ! ' Do not our readers 
recognize here something characteristic of that modern 
French nation which, with much mixture of blood, has since 
inherited the ancient Gauls ? 

Caesar praises, too, a remarkable ingenuity of defense ex- 
hibited by the enemy — which reminds one that modern 
French inventiveness can boast a long descent. But noth- 
ing availed against the resolute persistence of the Romans. 
Avaricum is doomed. Caesar chooses the moment of a vio- 
lent tempest to storm the walls. There followed a frightful 
massacre. His soldiers, Caesar tells us, spared no class, not 
the old, not women, and not children. Of forty thousand, 
scarce eight hundred escaped to reach Vercingetorix in 
safety. These mournful refugees Vercingetorix arranged to 
receive in silence during the night, not in a body, lest the 
effect should be too much for the nerves of his army, but in 
separate groups severally consigned to different quarters of 
his camp. 

The behavior of this general in adversity excites our 
admiration and our sympathy. He calls a council, before 
which he holds a high language of consolation, of courage, 
and of hope. His bearing sustains the spirit of his country- 
men. They remember that Vercingetorix advised, from the 
first, against defending Avaricum. His influence is rather 
strengthened than weakened by the calamity. 

Caesar, meantime, feasted and refreshed his famished men 
on the plenty that he found in captured Avaricum. But here 
he had new trouble. The ^Eduans are at odds among them- 
selves. Two contending factions bring the state to the very 
brink of civil war. One of these factions might turn to Ver- 
cingetorix for support. Caesar must visit the ^Eduans. Visit 
them he does, and bids them be at peace among themselves, 
help him in the present war, and see what he will do for 



Ccesar. 183 

them when all is over. This said, and one of the leaders of 
faction by him duly pronounced magistrate, Caesar returned 
to the war. But all did not avail. Caesar's preferred ^Edu- 
an is himself disloyal to Caesar, and the whole ^Eduan state 
goes over to the enemy. One wide conflagration of revolt 
now enwraps almost the entire region of Gaul. 

Various vicissitudes of war follow, which our space forbids 
us to describe in detail. It must suffice to say that Caesar's 
siege of one important town issues in defeat and disaster to 
his arms. Through the defection of the yEduans, he loses, 
too, a town of theirs, in which he had accumulated a vast 
reserve of resources for the war. In short, the situation be- 
comes perilous for the Romans. 

But, at this point in our narrative, we plan an agreeable 
change for our readers. We are going to let the German 
historian of Rome, Theodor Mommsen, tell you the story of 
the end. You will like to have a specimen of the large, 
luminous way in which this hero-worshiping, but enlightened, 
historian deals with his subject. Vercingetorix has thrown 
himself with his whole army into the town of A-le'si-a. He, 
however, establishes also a camp outside. Town and camp 
together, with works extending not less than ten miles, 
Caesar resolves to invest. Now Mommsen: 

"Vercingetorix had been prepared for a struggle under 
the walls, but not for being besieged in Alesia ; in that point 
of view the accumulated stores, considerable as they were, 
were yet far from sufficient for his army — which was said to 
amount to 80,000 infantry and 15,000 cavalry — and for the 
numerous inhabitants of the town. . . . Vercingetorix dis- 
missed his whole cavalry, and sent at the same time to 
the heads of the nation instructions to call forth all their 
forces and lead them to the relief of Alesia. , . . But 
Caesar made up his mind at once to besiege and to be 
besieged. He prepared his line of circumvallation for 
defense also on its outer side, and furnished himself with 



184 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

provisions for a longer period. The days passed; they had 
no longer a boll of grain in the fortress, and they were obliged 
to drive out the unhappy inhabitants of the town to perish 
miserably between the intrenchments of the Celts and of the 
Romans, pitilessly rejected by both. 

"At the last hour there appeared behind Caesar's lines the 
interminable array of the Celto-Belgic relieving army, said 
to amount to 250,000 infantry and 8,000 cavalry. From the 
Channel to the Cevennes the insurgent cantons had strained 
every nerve to rescue the flower of their patriots and the 
general of their choice — the Bellovaci alone had answered 
that they were disposed to fight against the Romans, but not 
beyond their own bounds. The first assault, which the 
besieged of Alesia and the relieving troops without made on 
the Roman double line, was repulsed ; but when, after a 
day's rest, it was repeated, the Celts succeeded — at a spot 
where the line of circumvallation ran over the slope of a hill 
and could be assailed from the height above — in filling up 
the trenches and hurling the defenders down from the ram- 
part. Then Labienus, sent thither by Caesar, collected the 
nearest cohorts, and threw himself with four legions on the 
foe. Under the eyes of the general, who himself appeared 
at the most dangerous moment, the assailants were driven 
back in a desperate hand-to-hand conflict, and the squadrons 
of cavalry that came with Caesar taking the fugitives in the 
rear completed the defeat. 

" It was more than a great victory ; the fate of Alesia, and 
indeed of the Celtic nation, was thereby irrevocably decided. 
The Celtic army, utterly disheartened, dispersed at once 
from the battle-field and went home. Vercingetorix might 
perhaps have even now taken to flight, or at least have saved 
himself by the last means open to a free man ; he did not 
do so, but declared in a council of war that, since he had 
not succeeded in breaking off the alien yoke, he was ready to 
give himself up as a victim, and to avert, so far as possible, 



CcBsar. 185 

destruction from the nation by bringing it on his own head. 
This was done. The Celtic officers delivered their general — 
the solemn choice of the whole nation — to the enemy of their 
country for such punishment as might be thought fit. 
Mounted on his steed, and in full armour, the king of the 
Arvernians appeared before the Roman proconsul and rode 
round his tribunal; then he surrendered his horse and arms, 
and sat down in silence on the steps at Caesar's feet. Five 
years afterward he was led in triumph through the streets of 
the Italian capital, and, while his conqueror was offering sol- 
emn thanks to the gods on the summit of the Capitol, Ver- 
cingetorix was beheaded at its foot as guilty of high treason 
against the Roman nation. ... It is impossible to part 
from the noble king of the Arverni without a feeling of 
historical and human sympathy ; but it is characteristic of 
the Celtic nation that its greatest man was after all merely 
a knight." 

The passage we have condensed from Dr. Mommsen's 
history deals with a subject perhaps the most striking in 
Caesar's Commentaries ; and in style it presents the historian 
at his best. We cannot in fairness suffer our readers to sup- 
pose that they would be equally entertained and instructed 
in all other parts of Mommsen's history of Rome. 

Mommsen is a very able man, and he is a very learned 
specialist in Roman history. But he presents a curious com- 
bination in himself of sentimentalism with abstract hardness 
of heart. He is genuinely philosophical, but his philosoph- 
ical generalizations are liable to be qualified by both these 
two apparently inconsistent traits in his character. We must 
not pause to write an essay on Mommsen, but we feel bound 
to advise our readers of the powerful bias under which he 
constructs his history of Rome. He is an idolater of Caesar. 
Caesar-worship dictates the point of view from which he sees 
nearly every thing that he describes. That our readers may 
judge for themselves how far we, in saying this, are from 



t86 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

exaggerating the fact, we show them Mommsen in the act of 
kneeling to burn his incense at Caesar's shrine : 

" Of such a personage [Caesar] our conceptions may well 
vary in point of shallowness or depth, but they cannot be, 
strictly speaking, different ; to every not utterly perverted 
inquirer the grand figure has exhibited the same essential 
features, and yet no one- has succeeded in reproducing it to 
the life. The secret lies in its perfection." 

The Caesarizing spirit of Mommsen is, perhaps, to be seen 
in the attempt which apparently he makes to have it appear 
that the ultimate murder of Vercingetorix was somehow a 
deed done for good reason, and in accordance with just law. 
For " high treason against the Roman nation," is a form of 
statement that seems to give a certain color of justification 
to what was in fact a piece of the purest brutality on the 
part of Caesar. Custom sanctioned, as the last and sharpest 
culmination of those bacchanalia of savagery and cruelty 
which go under the name of the Roman Triumph, the killing 
of captives in prison, to be accomplished at the moment when 
the conqueror reached the summit of the Capitol. This final 
taste of blood, the triumphing general might, if he chose, 
forego. Caesar did, in fact, forego it in some other cases. But 
princely and gallant Vercingetorix, who, having been defeated 
in the self-sacrificing attempt to vindicate the freedom of his 
country, had, in his defeat, thrown himself upon the magna- 
nimity of the victor, is by that victor abruptly cast into chains, 
in chains kept eating his high heart through more than five 
long dreary years, and then, after an interval during which any 
but a cold-blooded man's resentment might have found time 
to cool, is put to death in prison— as " guilty of high treason 
against the Roman nation," forsooth ! But we check our- 
selves in our indignation ; and, having thus simply put our 
readers on their guard against such idealizing historians as 
Dr. Mommsen, and such romancing apologists as Mr. Froude, 
pass on to finish our task with Caesar's Commentaries. 



Ccesar. 187 

Napoleon III. wrote a life of Caesar with most elaborate 
imperial care, and published it at most lavish imperial ex- 
pense. The hardly disguised object of that work was to set 
forth the parallel, real or imaginary, between Julius Caesar 
and Bonaparte, as also between Julius Caesar's grand-nephew, 
Augustus Caesar, and the French biographer himself, Napo- 
leon III., nephew of Bonaparte, "Caesarism " is, of course, 
the key-note of this biography. But even Napoleon III. is 
not so lunatic an admirer of Caesar as is Mommsen. Napo- 
leon admits it to be, for the sake of Caesar's glory, a matter 
of regret that his noble captive, Vercingetorix, was not 
spared. Or shall we suspect that it was Celtic sympathy in 
Napoleon, and German sympathy in Mommsen, that deter- 
mined respectively their sentiments toward Celtic Ver- 
cingetorix ? 

It is related, by the way, that Caesar's chariot was broken, 
on occasion of this triumph of his in which Vercingetorix 
was slain. After that, so the story goes, Caesar never took 
his seat in a chariot without repeating three times a certain 
form of words to act as a charm against accident. He also 
performed, in deprecation of the misfortunes supposed to be 
visited in compensation upon the too prosperous man, a sin- 
gular act of voluntary humility. He ascended the long flight 
of steps leading up to the temple of Capitoline Jupiter on 
his bended knees. What a parallel and contrast to Luther's 
famous ascent of the Santa. Scala ! And Caesar was in re° 
ligion a skeptic ! Would our readers like to know how Dr. 
Mommsen, alluding to such superstitions on the part of 
Caesar, guards himself against seeming at all to degrade the 
reputation of his hero for perfect sobriety of mind ? Why, 
" There was in Caesar's rationalism [practical good sense] a 
point at which it came in some measure into contact with 
mysticism " ! And would they like to see how Caesar's licen- 
tiousness, persisted in to the last, can be nearly hidden from 
sight under flowers of language, by an idolizing German 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



historian ? "Around him, as around all those whom the full 
lustre of woman's love has dazzled in youth, fainter gleams 
of it continued imperishably to linger"! Would they like, 
further, to see how bald-headed, grim-featured Caesar's weak 
vanity about his personal appearance can be touched into an 
illusion of something even rather winning ? " He retained a 
certain foppishness in his outward appearance, or, to speak 
more correctly, a pleasing consciousness of his own manly 
beauty "! Caesar had a commanding presence, but his " manly 
beauty " is, so far as we have been able to learn, strictly an 
evolution from the depths of the rapt German's own con- 
structive consciousness. Byron's ascription of infirmity to 
Caesar must stand for substantial truth : 

With but one weakest weakness — vanity. 

The foregoing expressions from Mommsen will be enough 
to apprise attentive readers of the care with which, when they 
study this really great writer's history of Rome, they must 
calculate for the historian's personal bias. 

The latest fashion in opinion, whatever that may chance to 
be, is by no means, because it is the latest, necessarily the 
right one. Our readers are entitled to know that various 
vogues in opinion have prevailed, from one period to another, 
as to the true character of Julius Caesar. The current 
vogue is favorable rather than adverse. A generation or two 
ago the case was otherwise. With a single further quota- 
tion from Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, to show more fully what 
it was the fashion, when he wrote, to think about Caesar, 
(Dr. Arnold, however, was not a man to follow fashion in 
thinking, he made fashion rather,) we leave the topic to our 
readers to make up each one his own mind for himself: 

" During the present summer, Caesar had, in fact, com- 
pleted the conquest of Gaul, by defeat of the formidable 
confederacy organized by Vercingetorix and by the capture 
of Alesia. By his successive victories he had amassed a 



Ccesar. 189 

treasure which, if we may judge by the effects ascribed to 
it, must have been enormous. ... To his own army his 
liberalities were almost unbounded, while his camp presented 
a place of refuge to the needy, the profligate, the debtors, 
and even the criminals who found it convenient to retreat 
from the capital. When it is remembered that the object of 
all this profusion was the enslaving of his country, and that 
the means which enabled him to practice it were derived 
from the unprovoked pillage of the towns and temples of 
Gaul, and the sale of those unfortunate barbarians who in 
the course of his unjust wars became his prisoners, it may 
be justly doubted whether the life of any individual recorded 
in history was ever productive of a greater amount of hu- 
man misery, or has been marked with a deeper stain of 
wickedness." 

" Agedincum " for Agendicum, " Hsedui " for ^Edui, read- 
ers will observe, are the spellings adopted by Mommsen. 
He also writes " Gaius " for Caius in Caesar's name. " Sulla " 
for Sylla, " Mithradates " for Mithridates, " Sugambri " for 
Sicambri, are other variations of his from the common orthog- 
raphy. These changes need not disturb any body. They 
are mostly points rather of taste and vogue than of correct- 
ness and scholarship. However, if, in such things, you like 
to be abreast of the progressive van in scholarship, follow 
Mommsen. We, for our part, decide to be moderate, rather 
than extreme. We adhere chiefly to the old ways. We 
shall therefore presently say Virgil, not "Vergil." "Celts," 
Mommsen calls the Gauls. This is an ethnic, rather than 
a geographic, designation. In race the Gauls and the 
Irish were allied. Celtic blood ran in the veins of both 
peoples. 

This little digression, of which, it may be, some more 
methodical among our readers have been silently and good- 
naturedly impatient, has in reality, let us assure them, been 
not inappropriate here, at the close of the last book of 



190 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Caesar's Commentaries. For this seventh book is in strict- 
ness the last book of Caesar's Commentaries. Caesar him- 
self did not write the eighth book, although that also bears 
his name. 

Eighth Book. 

The eighth book was written by one of Caesar's lieutenants, 
Aulus Hirtius. who begins with a rather fulsomely laudatory 
appreciation of his master's work, and an almost abject depre- 
cation of the charge against himself of rashness in presuming 
to complete what one so unapproachably his superior in talent 
had commenced. The book relates in very good imitation of 
Caesar's style— it is easy, you know, to make an egg stand on 
end after Columbus has shown you how— the incidents of 
that last Gallic campaign in which Caesar cleared off all the 
little arrearages of his task — to leave pacified Gaul, as Mr. 
Froude would have us believe, passionately attached to the 
person and interests of her conqueror. 

We dismiss this book with a single extract in literal trans- 
lation, luridly illustrative of one style of address adopted by 
Caesar in wooing and fixing the impulsive affections of the 
conquered. It is but just to say that Caesar had also his 
really amiable ways of attaching his subjects to himself. He 
was by instinct, as well as by judgment, humane, when hu- 
manity would serve his purposes. Humanity in the present 
case he thought would not do. 

The town of Ux-el-lo-du'num had been taken by siege, 
after obstinate resistance from the inhabitants. The capitu- 
lation was finally secured by a piece of almost fabulously 
vast and well-directed military engineering, on the part of 
the Romans, conducted under the personal supervision of 
the commander himself. The subterranean vein outside the 
walls, that supplied the town with water, was found and cut 
off. The towns-people declared it was the gods and not a 
man that had accomplished this. Hirtius thus relates what 
Caesar did after the capitulation : 



CcBsar. 191 

Czesar, being convinced that his lenity was known to all men, and 
being under no fears of being thought to act severely from a natural 
cruelty, and perceiving that there would be no end to his troubles if 
several states should attempt to rebel in like manner and in different 
places, resolved to deter others by inflicting an exemplary punishment 
on these. Accordingly he cut off the hands of those who had borne 
arms against him. Their lives he spared, that the punishment of their 
rebellion might be the more conspicuous. 

The trustworthiness of Mr. Froude as biographer of Caesar 
will have been sufficiently illustrated, if to what has hereto- 
fore been said on the point we now add that, though he of 
course tells the story of this siege and capture, he does not 
even once mention that crowning act of " clemency " on his 
hero's part, which Hirtius relates with a preface, in its adu- 
latory imputation of serene confidence to Caesar, so full of 
melancholy historic instruction. 

It is Caesar's peculiar distinction that he not only made 
history, but wrote the history that he made. Perhaps if 
humane Pompey, if honorable Lucullus, had left behind 
them commentaries of their campaigns, Caesar then, in the 
comparison, might have seemed to us the mild conqueror 
that he seemed to himself. Certainly as conqueror in the 
civil war, Caesar shows to extraordinary advantage in con- 
trast with the bloody Marius and the bloody Sylla. In just 
discrimination, however, this also needs to be said, that rea- 
sons for proscription and political murder existed to Sylla 
and to Marius, which to Julius Caesar, and to Caesar Augus- 
tus after him, were wanting. When these two Caesars got 
the power, there were left comparatively few enemies or 
rivals that they needed to fear! The state had been chiefly 
stripped of its greatest men — except such of those greatest 
men as were committed to the winning side. 

We bring to abrupt conclusion this exhaustless and fasci- 
nating subject, by gratifying the curiosity which we know our 
readers must have felt, to know something of the business 
relations that subsisted between Caesar and his soldiers. 



192 Pi-eparatory Latin Course in English. 

How were Caesar's soldiers paid ? Chiefly with great ex- 
pectations — expectations, however, which in the end were 
not disappointed. It was by no means a case, between 
Caesar and his men, of romantic purely disinterested mutual 
attachment of soldiers to their chief and of chief to his sol- 
diers. General and men were all of them soldiers of fortune 
together. They had to prosper, if they prospered, each by 
means of the other. Caesar depended on his legionaries, and 
his legionaries depended on Caesar. Neither party could get 
on alone. Caesar's wars were mostly personal wars. That 
is, they had no sanction of government. Caesar raised le- 
gions, and he waged war, on his own responsibility. It was 
freebootery on a colossal scale — winked at by the Roman 
government, but winked at not without many a qualm, on its 
part, of helpless disgust and resentment. Caesar's soldiers no 
doubt knew all this perfectly well. He early doubled the 
regular pay of his men. He gave them booty freely from 
time to time. Every legionary might count on having, for 
instance, a slave from among the prisoners of war, to be his 
own peculiar property, to serve his wants, to suffer his hu- 
mors. Besides this, there was the glittering chance always 
before the soldier's eyes of some more or less indefinite re- 
ward to be enjoyed when Caesar should come to his final 
goal. This unquestionably helps explain the celebrated in- 
cident of Caesar's dealing with his mutinous legions, during 
the civil war. Even his favored and favorite tenth came 
once to play a game of bluff with their old commander — they 
demanded to be discharged, and sent home. 'Entirely rea- 
sonable request,' said Caesar, easy master himself of the game 
which his tenth had blunderingly attempted to play — 'you 
shall be gratified.' The legion were confounded. It was the 
very last thing they really desired. They thought he could 
not get along without them. Perhaps he could not. But 
certainly they could not get along without him. This Caesar 
knew, and, with splendid mastery, he soon reduced the 



Ccssar. 193 



mutineers to beg for reinstatement in his army, on his own 
terms. Those veterans could not endure that raw soldiers 
of Caesar should march with their commander in future tri- 
umphs at Rome, while they themselves, who had bought dear 
that right in a hundred battles, should lose it, and lose be- 
sides whatever additional prizes they might hope to earn by 
additional victories achieved for Caesar. 

The soldiers of the early republic served without pay. 
They were sure, if they conquered, of a fair share in the 
spoil, and that would be worth to them far more than 
any reasonable wages. Caesar's soldiers, even at their double 
pay, received, what seems to us but a paltry sum, about 
thirty-seven dollars a year, for their service. But when 
Csesar came to triumph at Rome, then he opened his strong 
box, and sowed riches with both hands far and wide. Remem- 
ber that these were the riches of plunder. To every common 
soldier of his, he gave what was equivalent to a moderate 
fortune for one in his condition of life, nearly a thousand 
dollars in money. The centurions each received twice that 
amount. The prize was doubled again for the military trib- 
unes. When Caesar dealt with his officers, mutinous from 
fear of Ariovistus and the Germans, he claimed, in address- 
ing them, to have been a man above blame on the score of 
uprightness. What he specifically meant no doubt was that 
he had always treated his soldiers fairly in the matter of pay 
and of booty. There was, of course, no generosity in his 
lavishing money on his soldiers. The wealth of the world 
was his by plunder. He could not possibly use it all him- 
self. The simple question was, how should he dispose of his 
surplus ? 

On the occasion of his successive triumphs, he showed 
something of the same genius in scattering his plunder that he 
had shown in amassing it. He spread twenty-two thousand 
tables, and feasted the universal public of Rome. He gave 
every poor citizen meat, grain, oil, money, and remission of 



194 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

a year's rent. He made an artificial lake deep enough and 
wide enough to float a navy, and on its surface exhibited a 
sea-fight — not a sham-fight, but a real fight, in which thou- 
sands of Egyptians and thousands of Tyrians, respectively, 
killed each other for the delight of the populace. There 
were murmurs at this feature of Caesar's displays — not, how- 
ever, because it was cruel, but because it was wasteful! One 
almost incredible account says that the whole length of the 
street through which Caesar's triumphal procession passed 
was covered from the sun with awnings of silk. 

It is difficult not to feel with De Quincey that the Roman 
Empire founded by Caesar was less a form of civilization, 
than a magnificently masked essential barbarism, proceeding 
by unperceived degrees to disintegration — moral, social, po- 
litical — engendered from within. 

Let us redress once more the balance of praise and blame 
for Caesar, by quoting the highly rhetorical sentence of De 
Quincey on his relative rank in greatness among the ancients: 
" Unquestionably, for comprehensive talents, the Lucifer, 
the Protagonist of all antiquity." 



VII. 
CICERO'S ORATIONS. 

Cicero's writings form what has been finely called a library 
of reason and eloquence. We shall hereafter meet this al- 
ways welcome literary figure again, in the course of that vol- 
ume to follow the present, which treats the Latin read by the 
student in college. To that future occasion we postpone the 
biographical and critical notice which it seems fitting for us 
somewhere to make of this most modern of the ancients, 
this most cosmopolitan of Romans. 

The amount of reading in Cicero's orations required for 






Cicero's Orations. 



l 95 



entrance at college is somewhat indeterminate. That is to 
say, different colleges have different standards of require- 
ment. Most of them, we believe, ask for the four orations 
against Catiline and, together with these, two or three other 
of Cicero's orations, variously chosen by various authorities. 
What we give our readers will approximately represent the 
average requirement. 

It is to be regretted that many of our college graduates 
gain their sole impression of Cicero as orator from their 
reading of him in course of preparation for college. To the 
student in that preparatory stage of education, naturally 
even the most consummate pieces of eloquence can be but so 
many portions of dead literature, to be mastered for lame 
and impotent construing by him, simply as his open sesame 
at the entrance-gate of college. Our readers will, some of 
them at least, through experience of life producing maturity 
and wisdom of judgment, have become prepared to appre- 
ciate, better than boys and girls at school can do, the masterly 
art with which Cicero orders his narration, his argument, his 
representations, his appeals. Still, the conditions of eloquence 
change so much — with change of time, of place, of race, of po- 
sition, of civilization, of occasion — that oratory belonging, like 
Cicero's, to an order of things remote in every way from 
that in which we live, requires a large amount of prepara- 
tion on our part to judge it justly and to enjoy it to the full. 
Readers will be liable to disappointment in making first ac- 
quaintance here with oratory of so ancient, so constant, and 
so universal fame. But we had better, all of us, presume 
with much confidence that Cicero deserves his established and 
august reputation. If he fails to answer our ideal, perhaps 
our ideal, rather than Cicero, is at fault. Or perhaps we 
have failed to study Cicero, and Cicero's occasion, deeply 
enough. Imagine somebody, two thousand years hence, 
four thousand miles away, spelling out, in a language not 
only foreign but long dead, an American speech of to-day, 



196 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

delivered on some occasion as obsolete as is now the conspir- 
acy of Catiline. What speech of what orator would you 
select as likely to interest that supposed reader, more than 
Cicero's invectives against Catiline interest you — as likely to 
satisfy that reader's ideal of eloquence better than your ideal 
of eloquence is satisfied in Cicero? 

Of Cicero as an orator it may summarily be said that he 
was, first of all, and always, as clear as a sunbeam — this, 
both as to his general order in the speech, and as to the 
structure of the particular sentence — full in matter, copious, 
while pure, in diction, harmonious in rhythm, in temper by 
preference urbane, though capable of the utmost truculence, 
unsurpassed in skill of self-adjustment to the demands of 
his occasion. When, in the next succeeding volume of the 
present series, we come to the eloquence of Demosthenes, 
we may seek to set the Roman's style in a still stronger light, 
by comparing and contrasting it with the style of the Greek. 
The English Burke, we believe, consciously modeled his 
own oratory on the oratory of Cicero. 

Notwithstanding what we have said of the inevitable tend- 
ency to obsolescence in all oratory, it yet remains true — 
such is the perfection of Cicero's oratorical and literary art 
— that the reader will find singularly little narrative explana- 
tion necessary that is not furnished within the productions 
themselves which we are here about to present. This, how- 
ever, is less the case with the last oration to follow, than with 
the others. 

We first bring forward (in specimen only, for our bounds 
are inelastic) that celebrated oration of Cicero's, in which 
he lauds the character of Caesar. There is here a generous 
effusion of eulogy, such as to one not familiar with the amen- 
ity, the affluence, the Italian enthusiasm, of the speaker's 
oratorical temperament, might well seem insincere and ful- 
some. But there are several considerations necessary to be 
kept in mind in order to the forming of a just judgment on 



Cicero* s Orations. 197 



the real quality of this high-wrought panegeric of Cicero's on 
Caesar. 

You must remember that Caesar was now undisputed sole 
master of the world. You must remember that he had, since 
his victory in the civil war, exhibited extraordinary modera- 
tion in the use of boundless power. You must remember, 
that, to the strained anxiety of the Roman public dreading 
to see renewed the frightful scenes of the times of Marius 
and of Sylla, this self-control and mildness on Caesar's part 
had brought a sense of relief whose reaction made men al- 
most mad with joy. You must remember that Cicero, besides 
consciously speaking in the presence of a diffused sentiment 
like this, himself shared the sentiment to a degree commen- 
surate with the genial warmth of his own exceptionally 
vivid sympathies. You must remember that a capital in- 
stance of Caesar's clemency had, under striking, almost the- 
atrical, circumstances, just occurred in the senate. You 
must remember that Cicero's personal affections were in that 
instance ardently engaged. And finally, perhaps chiefly, 
you must remember that Cicero praised not simply the vir- 
tues which he saw in Caesar, but the virtues which, for his 
own sake and for the sake of mankind, he wished to see, and 
which, therefore, he would help create or confirm in Caesar, 
by thus magnanimously praising them. The extravagance 
of Cicero's rhetoric will surely seem somewhat modified in 
view of considerations such as these, however yet it may 
pass the bounds of decorum prescribed by our colder north- 
ern taste and judgment. Cicero is to be thought of as an 
Italian, rather than as a typical Roman. His style in gen- 
eral is Asiatic, by an exuberance that true Roman austerity 
would have chastised and corrected. 

The oration for Marcus Marcellus had this occasion. 
Marcellus had fought for Pompey and against Caesar in the 
civil war. After the decisive defeat of Pharsalia he with- 
drew to Myt'i-le'ne, and there devoted himself to rhetoric 



198 Preparatory Latt7i Course in English. 

and philosophy. Marcellus's cousin one day in full senate 
prostrated himself before Caesar to implore the dictator's 
pardon for his kinsman. The whole body of the senators 
did likewise. Caesar yielded and pardoned the exile. Pope 
had this occasion in mind when he wrote his couplet, 

And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels, 
Than Caesar with a senate at his heels. 

Cicero, as a life-long friend of the pardoned man, instantly 
responded in a speech which, on being subsequently written 
out, took the form in which it here appears. 

Literary and historical critics have found much, in litera- 
ture, profane as well as sacred, to assail with their weapons 
of skepticism, and this oration has not escaped their serious 
challenge. Some very high authorities have doubted wheth- 
er it ever was either spoken or written by Cicero. But the 
best way for our readers is to go with the majority — and be- 
lieve that they are now enjoying a genuine, and a very fine, 
specimen of Cicero's rhetoric. 

It should have been added that, besides being a Pompeian, 
Marcellus had further offended Caesar by once proposing in the 
senate a decree to deprive him of his command. The clem- 
ency that Cicero celebrates is thus seen to be really remark- 
able. Toward his countrymen, Caesar was certainly a very 
magnanimous conqueror. But here is Cicero's 

Oration for Marcus Marcellus. 

This day, O conscript fathers, [literally, "enrolled or elect fathers," 
the customary style of address to the Roman senate,] has brought with 
it an end to the long silence in which I have of late indulged ; not out 
of any fear, but partly from sorrow, partly from modesty ; and at the 
same time it has revived in me my ancient habit of saying what my 
wishes and opinions are. For I cannot by any means pass over in si- 
lence such great humanity, such unprecedented and unheard-of clem- 
ency, such moderation in the exercise of supreme and universal power, 
such incredible and almost godlike wisdom. For now that Marcus 
Marcellus, O conscript fathers, has been restored to you and the repub- 






Cicero's Orations. 199 



lie, I think that not only his voice and authority are preserved and re- 
stored to you and to the republic, but my own also. 

For I was concerned, O conscript fathers, and most exceedingly 
grieved, when I saw such a man as he is, who had espoused the same 
cause which I myself had, not enjoying the same good fortune as my- 
self ; nor was I able to persuade myself to think it right or fair that I 
should be going on in my usual routine, while that rival and imitator of 
my zeal and labors, who had been a companion and comrade of mine 
throughout, was separated from me. Therefore, you, O Caius Csesar, 
have re-opened to me my former habits of life, which were closed up, 
and you have raised, as it were, a standard to all these men, as a sort 
of token to lead them to entertain hopes of the general welfare of the 
republic. For it was seen by me before in many instances, and espe- 
cially in my own, and now it is clearly understood by every body, since 
you have granted Marcus Marcellus to the senate and people of Rome, 
in spite of your recollection of all the injuries you have received at his 
hands, that you prefer the authority of this order and the dignity of the 
republic to the indulgence of your own resentment or your own sus- 
picions. 

He, indeed, has this day reaped the greatest possible reward for the 
virtuous tenor of his previous life ; in the great unanimity of the senate in 
his favor, and also in your own most dignified and important opinion of 
him. And from this you, in truth, must perceive what great credit there 
is in conferring a kindness, when there is such glory to be got even by 
receiving one. And he, too, is fortunate whose safety is now the cause 
of scarcely less joy to all other men than it will be to himself when he 
is informed of it. And this honor has deservedly and most rightfully 
fallen to his lot. For who is superior to him either in nobleness of birth, 
or in honesty, or in zeal for virtuous studies, or in purity of life, or in 
any description whatever of excellence ? 

No one is blessed with such a stream of genius, no one is endowed 
with such vigor and richness of eloquence, either as a speaker or as a 
writer, as to be able, I will not say to extol, but even, O Caius Caesar, 
plainly to relate, all your achievements. Nevertheless, I assert, and with 
your leave I maintain, that in all of them you never gained greater and 
truer glory than you have acquired this day. I am accustomed often to 
keep this idea before my eyes, and often to affirm in frequent conversa- 
tions, that all the exploits of our own generals, all those of foreign na- 
tions and of most powerful states, all the mighty deeds of the most il- 
lustrious monarchs, can be compared with yours neither in the magni- 
tude of your wars, nor in the number of your battles, nor in the variety 



200 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

of countries which you have conquered, nor in the rapidity of your con- 
quests, nor in the great difference of character with which your wars have 
been marked ; and that those countries the most remote from each other 
could not be traveled over more rapidly by any one in a journey, than 
they have been visited by your, I will not say journeys but, victories. 

And if I were not to admit that those actions are so great that scarcely 
any man's mind or comprehension is capable of doing justice to them, I 
should be very senseless. But there are other actions greater than 
those. For some people are in the habit of disparaging military glory, 
and of denying the whole of it to the generals, and of giving the multi- 
tude a share of it also, so that it may not be the peculiar property of the 
commanders. And, no doubt, in the affairs of war, the valor of the 
troops, the advantages of situation, the assistance of allies, fleets, and sup- 
plies, have great influence ; and a most important share in all such 
transactions, Fortune claims for herself, as of her right ; and whatever 
has been done successfully she considers almost entirely as her own 
work. 

But in this glory, O Caius Caesar, which you have just earned, you 
have no partner. The whole of this, however great this may be — and 
surely it is as great as possible, — the whole of it, I say, is your own. 
The centurion can claim for himself no share of that praise, neither can 
the prefect, nor the battalion, nor the squadron. Nay, even that very 
mistress of all human affairs, Fortune herself, cannot thrust herself into 
any participation in that glory ; she yields to you ; she confesses that it 
is all your own, your peculiar private desert. For rashness is never 
united with wisdom, nor is chance ever admitted to regulate affairs con- 
ducted with prudence. 

You have subdued nations, savage in their barbarism, countless in 
their numbers, boundless, if we regard the extent of country peopled by 
them, and rich in every kind of resource ; but still you were only con- 
quering things, the nature and condition of which was such that they 
could be overcome by force. For there is no strength so great that it 
cannot be weakened and broken by arms and violence. But to subdue 
one's inclinations, to master one's angry feelings, to be moderate in the 
hour of victory, to not merely raise from the ground a prostrate adver- 
sary, eminent for noble birth, for genius, and for virtue, but even to in- 
crease his previous dignity — they are actions of such a nature, that the 
man who does them, I do not compare to the most illustrious man, but 
I consider equal to God. 

Therefore, O Caius Caesar, those military glories of yours will be cel- 
ebrated not only in our own literature and language, but in those of 



Cicero's Orations. 201 



almost all nations ; nor is there any age which will ever be silent about 
your praises. But still, deeds of that sort, somehow or other, even when 
they are read, appear to be overwhelmed with the cries of the soldiers 
and the sound of the trumpets. But when we hear or read of any thing 
which has been done with clemency, with humanity, with justice, with 
moderation, and with wisdom, especially in a time of anger, which is 
very adverse to prudence, and in the hour of victory, which is nat- 
urally insolent and haughty, with what ardor are we then inflamed, 
(even if the actions are not such as have really been performed, but are 
only fabulous,) so as often to love those whom -we have never seen ! 
But as for you, whom we behold present among us, whose mind, and 
feelings, and countenance we at this moment see to be such, that you 
wish to preserve every thing which the fortune of war has left to the re- 
public, O with what praises must we extol you ? with what zeal must 
we follow you ? with what affection must we devote ourselves to you ? 
The very walls, I declare, the very walls of this senate-house appear to 
me eager to return you thanks ; because, in a short time, you will have 
restored their ancient authority to this venerable abode of themselves 
and of their ancestors. 

Now no one can read intelligently the foregoing repre- 
sentative extract, about one quarter of the whole, from this 
senatorial speech of Cicero, without perceiving that, both in 
the lines and between the lines of the speech, there unmis- 
takably betrays itself the spirit of the patriot consenting to 
speak, nay, generously rejoicing to speak, in the words of the 
personal encomiast. The orator hoped well concerning the 
republic. Cicero's letters, written about the date of this 
speech, make it probable that the trust was not yet extinct 
in his breast that Caesar was going to restore the ancient 
freedom and constitution. Caesar should be helped on to any- 
such goal of his thought by every incitement of appreciation 
shown him beforehand. The praise, then, was less mere adu- 
lation, than pregnant wisdom of oratory and statesmanship. 
Cicero was not playing a part, the part of a flatterer. He 
really hoped, in the magnanimous exaltation of the moment, 
that what he said in hyperbole was substantially true, or at 
least might be helped to become true if he should unseal 
9* 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



those eloquent lips of his to say it. The forms of senatorial 
comity permitted much apparent exaggeration of phrase. He 
did not stint language. He poured it out abundantly and 
made his speech — which, perhaps, after all, our readers, not- 
withstanding what their author here says in explanation, will 
feel to have been inexcusably laudatory. Holding the 
opinion that we do, we shall say no more to press the opin- 
ion on our readers. Think what you will, dear friends — but 
think wisely, with exercise of that historic sense, of that dip- 
lomatic sense, which leads to just consideration of the bear- 
ing and relation of things. 

You will feel a startling contrast in tone, a contrast that 
we purposely seek for you, when we follow up this gracious, 
suave, complaisant utterance of Cicero's, with two of his 
speeches against Catiline. These speeches had a very differ- 
ent occasion, and were made under widely different circum- 
stances from those of the foregoing. There was a wide-spread 
dangerous political movement on foot at Rome, desperate 
enough in its aim and in its measures, as also in the character 
of the men concerned in it, to be justly branded a conspir- 
acy. This was before, but not many years before, Csesar 
went to Gaul. Of this conspiracy, the leading spirit was 
Lucius Catilina, commonly now among us called Catiline. 
Catiline was a member of the senate, and many of his fellow- 
conspirators belonged to the same body. He was bankrupt 
in fortune and in name — by general agreement an abandoned 
man. But he was as able as he was unscrupulous. 

Catiline's high birth entitled him to hopes of political pre- 
ferment. He had been candidate against Cicero for the 
consulship. Defeated, he was not disheartened. Another 
year he tried his fortune again, playing his game with loaded 
dice ; for he practiced bribery on a scale so vast that Cicero 
proposed a new law against the corruption. Catiline felt 
himself aimed at, and plotted against Cicero's life. Cicero 
in open senate charged on him this design, and the consuls 



Cicero's Orations. 



203 



to meet the emergency were by decree invested with dicta- 
torial powers. Catiline's hopes of election, and his plot to 
assassinate Cicero, were thwarted together. 

Desperate now, he rushed into courses the most extreme. 
A general rising was to be instigated throughout Italy, 
Rome was to be fired in numerous places at once, the senate 
were all to be put to death, likewise the personal and polit- 
ical enemies of the conspirators. Pompey's sons, however, 




POMPEY THE GREAT. 

were to be kept alive, as hostages to secure the proper be- 
havior of Pompey, who in command of an army in the East 
held the really effective power in the state. 

Of all this stupendous iniquity, plotted in darkness, Cicero 
was fortunate enough and skillful enough to learn, from one 
of the conspirators gained over through the arts of that con- 
spirator's mistress. Cicero managed the affair with perfect 
adroitness. Things proceeded until he summoned a meeting 



204 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

of the senate in the temple of Jupiter at the foot of the 
Palatine hill, (some say on the Capitoline hill,) a place of 
assembling resorted to only under circumstances of the most 
threatening danger. Catiline was brazen enough to attend 
himself this session of the senate. His entrance created a 
sensation, and that sensation Cicero heightened by break- 
ing into the following strain of personal invective, taken 
from what is known as the first oration against Catiline. 
There are four such orations in all. Of these the first and 
last were delivered in the senate, the second and third in the 
forum to the popular assembly of citizens. The style, or 
rather the course of treatment adopted, differs according to 
the character of the audience addressed, and according to 
the object sought to be accomplished, by the orator. Here, 
then, is a condensation of the 

First Oration against Catiline. 

When, O Catiline, do you mean to cease abusing our patience ? 
How long is that madness of yours still to mock us ? When is there to 
be an end of that unbridled audacity of yours, swaggering about as it 
does now? Do not the night guards placed on the Palatine Hill -do 
not the watches posted throughout the city — does not the alarm of the 
people, and the union of all good men — does not the precaution taken of 
assembling the senate in this most defensible place — do not the looks 
and countenances of this venerable body here present, have any effect 
upon you ? Do you not feel that your plans are detected ? Do you not 
see that your conspiracy is already arrested and rendered powerless by 
the knowledge which every one here possesses of it? What is there that 
you did last night, what the night before — where is it that you were — 
who was there that you summoned to meet you — what design was there 
which was adopted by you, with which you think that any one of us is 
unacquainted? 

Shame on the age and on its principles ! The senate is aware of these 
things ; the consul sees them ; and yet this man lives. Lives ! ay, he 
comes even into the senate. He takes a part in the public delibera- 
tions ; he is watching and marking down and checking off for slaughter 
every individual among us. And we, gallant men that we are, think 
that we are doing our duty to the republic if we keep out of the way of 
his frensied attacks. 



Cicero's Orations. 



You ought, O Catiline,long ago to have been led to execution by 
command of the consul. That destruction which you have been long 
plotting against us ought to have already fallen on your own head. 

What ? Did not that most illustrious man, Publius Scipio, the Ponti- 
fex Maximus, in his capacity of a private citizen, put to death Tiberius 
Gracchus, though but slightly undermining the constitution ? And shall 
we, who are the consuls, tolerate Catiline, openly desirous to destroy the 
whole world with fire and slaughter ? For I pass over older instances, 
such as how Caius Servilius A-ha'la with his own hand slew Spurius 
Mselius when plotting a revolution in the state. There was — there was 
once such virtue in this republic, that brave men would repress mis- 
chievous citizens with severer chastisement than the most bitter enemy. 
For we have a resolution of the senate, a formidable and authoritative 
decree against you, O Catiline ; the wisdom of the republic is not at 
fault, nor the dignity of this senatorial body. We, we alone — I say it 
openly — we, the consuls, are wanting in our duty. 

The senate once passed a decree that Lucius O-pim'i-us, the consul, 
should take care that the republic suffered no injury. Not one night 
elapsed. There was put to death, on some mere suspicion of disaffec- 
tion, Caius Gracchus, a man whose family had borne the most unblem- 
ished reputation for many generations. There was slain Marcus Fulvius, 
a man of consular rank, and all his children. By a like decree of the 
senate the safety of the republic was intrusted to Caius Marius and 
Lucius Valerius, the consuls. Did not the vengeance of the republic, 
did not execution overtake Lucius Sat'ur-ni'nus, a tribune of the people, 
and Caius Servilius, the praetor, without the delay of one single day? 
But we, for these twenty days, have been allowing the edge of the senate's 
authority to grow blunt, as it were. For we are in possession of a sim- 
ilar decree of the senate, but we keep it locked up in its parchment — 
buried, I may say, in the sheath ; and according to this decree you 
ought, O Catiline, to be put to death this instant. You live — and you 
live, not to lay aside, but to persist in your audacity. 

I wish, O conscript fathers, to be merciful ; I wish not to appear 
negligent amid such danger to the state ; but I do now accuse 
myself of remissness and culpable inactivity. A camp is pitched in 
Italy, at the entrance of Etruria, in hostility to the republic ; the number 
of the enemy increases every day ; and yet the general of that camp, 
the leader of those enemies, we see within the walls — ay, and even in 
the senate— planning every day some internal injury to the republic If, 
O Catiline, I should now order you to be arrested, to be put to death, I 
should, I suppose, have to fear lest all good men should say that I had 



206 Preparatoiy Latin Course in English. 

acted tardily, rather than that any one should affirm that I acted cruelly. 
But yet this, which ought to have been done long since, I have good reason 
for not doing as yet ; I will put you to death, then, when there shall be 
not one person possible to be found so wicked, so abandoned, so like 
yourself, as not to allow that it has been rightly done. As long as one 
person exists who can dare to defend you, you shall live ; but you shall 
live as you do now, surrounded by my many and trusty guards, so that 
you shall not be able to stir one finger against the republic : many eyes 
and ears shall still observe and watch you, as they have hitherto done, 
though you shall not perceive them. 

O ye immortal gods, where on earth are we ? in what city are we 
living? what constitution is ours? There are here — here in our body, 
O conscript fathers, in this the most holy and dignified assembly of the 
whole world, men who meditate my death, and the death of all of us, and 
the destruction of this city, and of the whole world. I, the consul, see 
them ; I ask them their opinion about the republic, and I do not yet at- 
tack, even by words, those who ought to be put to death by the sword. 

But now, what is that life of yours that you are leading? For I will 
speak to you not so as to seem influenced by the hatred I ought to feel, 
but by pity, nothing of which is due to you. You came a little while 
ago into the senate : in so numerous an assembly, who of so many 
friends and connections of yours saluted you ? If this in the memory of 
man never happened to any one else, are you waiting for insults, by 
word of mouth, when you are overwhelmed by the most irresistible 
condemnation of silence ? Is it nothing that at your arrival all those seats 
were vacated ? that all the men of consular rank, who had often been 
marked out by you for slaughter, the very moment you sat down, left 
that part of the benches bare and vacant ? With what feelings do you 
think you ought to bear this ? On my honor, if my slaves feared me 
as all your fellow-citizens fear you, I should think I must leave my 
house. Do not you think you should leave the city ? If I saw that I was 
even undeservedly so suspected and hated by my fellow-citizens, I would 
rather flee from their sight than be gazed at by the hostile eyes of every 
one. And do you who, from the consciousness of your wickedness, 
know that the hatred of all men is just and has been long due to you, 
hesitate to avoid the sight and presence of those men whose minds and 
senses you offend? If your parents feared and hated you, and if you 
could by no means pacify them, you would, I think, depart somewhere 
out of their sight. Now, your country, which is the common parent of 



Cicero's Orations. 207 



all of us, hales and fears you, and has no other opinion of you, than 
that you are meditating parricide in her case ; and will you neither feel 
awe of her authority, nor deference for her judgment, nor fear of her 
power ? 

And she, O Catiline, thus pleads with you, and after a manner silently 
speaks to you : There has now for many years been no crime committed 
but by you ; no atrocity has taken place without you ; you alone un- 
punished and unquestioned have murdered the citizens, have harassed 
and plundered the allies ; you alone have had power not only to neglect 
all laws and investigations, but to overthrow and break through them. 
Your former actions, though they ought not to have been borne, yet I 
did bear as well as I could ; but now that I should be wholly occupied 
with fear of you alone, that at every sound I should dread Catiline, that 
no design should seem possible to be entertained against me which does 
not proceed from your wickedness, this is no longer endurable. Depart, 
then, and deliver me from this fear ; that, if it be a just one, I may not 
be destroyed ; if an imaginary one, that at least I may at last cease to 
fear. 

I will let you see what these men [Catiline's fellow-senators] think of 
you. Be gone from the city, O Catiline, deliver the republic from fear ; 
depart into banishment, if that is the word you are waiting for. What 
now, O Catiline ? Do you not perceive, do you not see the silence 
of these men ? they permit it, they say nothing ; why wait you for the 
authority of their words, when you see their wishes in their silence ? 

But had I said the same to this excellent young man, Publius Sextius, 
or to that brave man, Marcus Marcellus, before this time the senate 
would deservedly have laid violent hands on me, consul though I be, in 
this very temple. But as to you, Catiline, while they are quiet they ap- 
prove, while they permit me to speak they vote, while they are silent 
they are loud and eloquent. 

O conscript fathers, let the worthless begone — let them separate them- 
selves from the good — let them collect in one place — let them, as I have 
often said before, be separated from us by a wall ; let them cease to plot 
against the consul in his own house — to surround the tribunal of the 
city prsetor — to besiege the senate-house with words — to prepare brands 
and torches to burn the city ; let it, in short, be written on the brow of 
every citizen, what are his sentiments about the republic. I promise 
you this, O conscript fathers, that there shall be so much diligence in 
us the consuls, so much authority in you, so much virtue in the Roman 



208 Preparatory Latin Course in E?iglish. 

knights, so much unanimity in all good men, that you shall see every 
thing made plain and manifest by the departure of Catiline — every thing 
checked and punished 

With these omens, O Catiline, begone to your impious and nefarious 
war, to the great safety of the republic, to your own misfortune and 
injury, and to the destruction of those who have joined themselves to 
you in every wickedness and atrocity. Then do you, O Jupiter, who 
were consecrated by Romulus with the same auspices as this city, whom 
we rightly call the stay of this city and empire, repel this man and his 
companions from your altars and from the other temples — from the 
houses and walls of the city — from the lives and fortunes of all the 
citizens ; and overwhelm all the enemies of good men, the foes of the 
republic, the robbers of Italy, men bound together by a treaty and in- 
famous alliance of crimes, dead and alive, with eternal punishments. 

The peculiar effect of the noble Ciceronian rhetoric is 
necessarily to a great extent lost in any translation. We 
use the rendering supplied to us in Bonn's Classical Library. 
The sense is generally well transferred, but one regrets that 
a translator, otherwise so competent, should not have had a 
little more feeling of style. Take, for example, the sentence 
in the second page of our extract : " But we, for these twenty 
days, have been allowing the edge of the senate's authority 
to grow blunt, as it were." The " as it were " is an addition 
of the translator's. How it enfeebles the sentence ! Placed 
as it is at the end, it has almost the effect of intentional hu- 
morous burlesque. What Cicero said was : " But we consuls 
now the twentieth day are suffering to grow blunt the edge 
of this body's authority." This example of the translator's 
execution is perhaps extreme, but it by no means stands 
alone. Our readers will have to imagine the nerve and force 
of expression to be at least doubled throughout in the orig- 
inal. "O temporal O mores!" is rendered, indeed, in its 
purport, but not in its power by, " Shame on the age and on 
its principles ! " " O, the times ! O, the manners [morals] ! " 
would be literal. 

The effect of a speech so very unconventionally frank, on 



Cicero's Orations. 209 



the person against whom it was aimed, seems not to have been 
immediately and overwhelmingly discomposing. Catiline 
begged that the senate would not be hasty in giving credit 
to the wild accusations of Cicero. The senate responded 
with cries of "Traitor!" and "Parricide!" This enraged 
Catiline, and he declared that the flame which his enemies 
were kindling around him he would quench in the general 
ruin. He flung himself out of the temple. 

Our readers are all familiar with extracts at least from the 
tragedy of " Catiline " by George Croly. That is a work of 
some real power, a little overstrained perhaps in intensity 
of expression, but well worth studying in connection with 
these orations of Cicero. Ben Jonson has a drama on the 
same subject. 

11 1 go, but I return ! " Croly makes Catiline, leaving the 
senate, exclaim. He did go to the camp of the army col- 
lected by the conspirators, designing to come back at the 
head of a column of troops. He took with him, among other 
things, a silver eagle once used by Marius in fighting the 
Cimbri. This standard he made much of as invested with 
some supernatural charm. Cicero had now a task of justify- 
ing himself before the people of Rome. Catiline's friends 
got it reported that Catiline had gone into voluntary exile to 
Marseilles, driven forth by the violence of the consul. To 
meet the popular odium sought thus to be excited against 
himself, and in general to satisfy public opinion in Rome 
that what had been done had been wisely done, Cicero 
harangued the people in the forum. We give some extracts 
from this address, usually called the 

Second Oration against Catiline. 

At length, O Romans, we have dismissed from the city, or driven out, 
or, when he was departing of his own accord, we have pursued with 
words, Lucius Catiline, mad with audacity, breathing wickedness, im- 
piously planning mischief to his country, threatening fire and sword to 
you and to this city. He is gone, he has departed, he has disappeared, 



2io Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



he has rushed out. No injury will now be prepared against these walls 
within the walls themselves by that monster and prodigy of wicked- 
ness. . . . Now he lies prostrate, O Romans, and feels himself stricken 
down and abject, and often casts back his eyes toward this city, which 
he mourns over as snatched from his jaws, but which seems to me to re- 
joice at having vomited forth such a pest, and cast it out of doors. 

But if there be any one of that disposition which all men should have, 
who yet blames me greatly for the very thing in which my speech exults 
and triumphs — namely, that I did not arrest so capital mortal an enemy 
rather than let him go— that is not my fault, O citizens, but the fault of 
the times. Lucius Catiline ought to have been visited with the severest 
punishment, and to have been put to death long since ; and both the 
customs of our ancestors, and the rigor of my office, and the republic, 
demanded this of me ; but how many, think you, were there who did 
not believe what I reported ? how many who out of stupidity did not 
think so? how many who even defended him ? how many who, out of 
their own depravity, favored him? If, in truth, I had thought that, if 
he were removed, all danger would be removed from you, I would long 
since have cut off Lucius Catiline, had it been at the risk, not only of 
my popularity, but even of my life. 

There is no nation for us to fear — no king who can make war on the 
Roman people. All foreign affairs are tranquil ized, both by land and 
sea, by the valor of one man, [Pompey.] Domestic war alone remains* 
The only plots against us are within our own walls — the danger is within — 
the enemy is within. We must war with luxury, with madness, with 
wickedness. For this war, O citizens, I offer myself as the general. 
I take on myself the enmity of profligate men. What can be cured, I 
will cure, by whatever means it may be possible. What must be cut 
away, I will not suffer to spread, to the ruin of the republic. Let them 
depart, or let them stay quiet ; or if they remain in the city and in the 
same disposition as at present, let them expect what they deserve. 

I will tell you, O Romans, of what classes of men those forces are 
made up, and then, if I can, I will apply to each the medicine of my 
advice and persuasion. 

There is one class of them, who, with enormous debts, have still greater 
possessions, and who can by no means be detached from their affection 
to them. . . . But I think these men are the least of all to be dreaded, 
because they can either be persuaded to abandon their opinions, or if 
they cling to them, they seem to me more likely to form wishes against 
the republic than to bear arms against it. 



Cicero's Orations. 211 



There is another class of them, who, although they are harassed by 
debt, yet are expecting supreme power ; they wish to become masters. 
... If these had already got that which they with the greatest madness 
wish for, do they think that in the ashes of the city and blood of the 
citizens, which in their wicked and infamous hearts they desire, they 
will become consuls and dictators, and even kings? Do they not see 
that they are wishing for that which, if they were to obtain it, must be 
given up to some fugitive slave, or to some gladiator ? 

There is a third class, already touched by age, but still vigorous from 
constant exercise. . . . These are colonists, who, from becoming pos- 
sessed of unexpected and sudden wealth, boast themselves extravagantly 
and insolently ; these men, while they build like rich men, while they 
delight in farms, in litters, in vast families of slaves, in luxurious ban- 
quets, have incurred such great debts, that, if they would be saved, they 
must raise Sylla from the dead. . . . Let them cease to be mad, and to 
think of proscriptions and dictatorships ; for such a horror of these 
times is ingrained into the city, that not even men, but it seems to me 
that even the very cattle, would refuse to bear them again. 

There is a fourth class, various, promiscuous, and turbulent ; . . . 
not so much active soldiers as lazy insolvents. ... As to these, I do 
not understand why, if they cannot live with honor, they should wish 
to die shamefully ; or why they think they shall perish with less pain 
in a crowd, than if they perish by themselves. 

There is a fifth class, of parricides, assassins; in short, of all infamous 
characters, whom I do not wish to recall from Catiline, and indeed 
they cannot be separated from him. Let them perish in their wicked 
war, since they are so numerous that a prison cannot contain them. 

There is a last class, last not only in number but in the sort of men 
and in their way of life ; the especial body-guard of Catiline, of his 
levying ; ay, the friends of his embraces and of his bosom ; whom 
you see with carefully-combed hair, glossy, beardless, or with well- 
trimmed beards ; with tunics with sleeves, or reaching to the ankles ; 
clothed with veils, not with robes, all the industry of whose life, all the 
labor of whose watchfulness, is expended in suppers lasting till day- 
break. 

On the one side are fighting modesty, on the other, wantonness ; on the 
one, chastity, on the other, uncleanness ; on the one, honesty, on the 
other, fraud; on the one, piety, on the other, wickedness ; on the one, con- 
sistency, on the other, insanity ; on the one, honor, on the other, baseness; 
on the one, continence, on the other, lust ; in short, equity, temperance, 
fortitude, prudence, all the virtues, contend against iniquity with luxury, 



212 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

against indolence, against rashness, against all the vices ; lastly, abundance 
contends against destitution, good plans against baffled designs, wisdom 
against madness, well-founded hope against universal despair. In a con- 
test and war of this sort, even if the zeal of men were to fail, will not the 
immortal gods compel such numerous and excessive vices to be defeated 
by these most eminent virtues? 

Now once more I wish those who have remained in the city, and who, 
contraiy to the safety of the city and of all of you, have been left in the 
city by Catiline, although they are enemies, yet because they were born 
citizens, to be warned again and again by me. ... If any one stirs in 
the city, and if I detect not only any action, but any attempt or design 
against the country, he shall feel that there are in this city vigilant con- 
suls, eminent magistrates, a brave senate, arms, and prisons, which 
our ancestors appointed as the avengers of nefarious and convicted 
crimes. 

... An internal civil war the most cruel and terrible in the memory 
of man, shall be put an end to by me alone in the robe of peace acting 
as general and commander-in-chief. . . . And this I promise you, O 
Romans, relying neither on my own prudence, nor on human counsels, 
but on many and manifest intimations of the will of the immortal gods ; 
under whose guidance I first entertained this hope and this opinion ; 
who are now defending their temples and the houses of the city, not afar 
off, as they were used to, from a foreign and distant enemy, but here on 
the spot, by their own divinity and present help. And you, O Romans, 
ought to pray to and implore them to defend from the nefarious wicked- 
ness of abandoned citizens, now that all the forces of all enemies are de- 
feated by land and sea, this city which they have ordained to be the 
most beautiful and flourishing of all cities. 

Look back and observe the sagacity with which the orator, 
instead of assuming the attitude of self-defense, begins by* 
boldly making a merit of his conduct. 

The third oration is interesting. It has even something 
of the interest of plot described, as well as of eloquence. 
It is addressed to the people, and it details, in masterly nar- 
ration, the incidents of the discovery of full documentary- 
evidence against the conspirators. The Allobroges had at 
the moment an embassy in Rome, with whom the conspira- 
tors had tampered. But Cicero received from these Gallic 



Cicero's Orations. 213 



envoys a hint of the approaches made to them. He bade 
them go on and obtain full knowledge of the plans of the 
conspirators. This they did. At Cicero's suggestion they 
demanded credentials in black and white which they might 
carry home to their nation. Such were supplied, and then, 
as they were withdrawing homeward, they were arrested and 
brought back with their papers in possession. The evidence 
was so unquestionable that the conspirators could not gain- 
say it, and one of them made a clean breast of the whole 
crime. Such in brief is what Cicero in this admirable pop- 
ular speech recites to his hearers. 

The subject of the fourth speech delivered in the senate 
is the disposal to be made of the conspirators now in custody. 
To put to death a Roman citizen, especially one of high 
extraction, was opposed to the traditionary popular preju- 
dice at Rome. However, the consul elect (not Cicero, but 
Silanus, Cicero's destined successor) did not scruple to de- 
clare in favor of the penalty of death. All speakers fol- 
lowing concurred in his opinion, until Julius Caesar rose and 
in a specious speech argued for imprisonment instead, together 
with confiscation of estate. Cato stood up strongly against 
Caesar. Some, however, of Cicero's friends inclined toward 
the more lenient view, deeming that less likely to prove injuri- 
ous to Cicero himself. On this, Cicero spoke in favor of the 
capital sentence. His weight and eloquence prevailed. The 
conspirators" were strangled by torchlight in their under- 
ground dungeon. The suppression of this conspiracy was 
an occasion of triumph to Cicero. No civilian's glory had 
ever been so great at Rome. He was saluted Pater Patri<z y 
"Father of his Fatherland." 

We have space for but little of this fourth speech. Our 
readers will, however, for several reasons demand to see 
how Cicero touches upon the opinions and arguments of his 
fellow-senator, Caesar. We extract briefly to show, from 
Cicero's statement of them, the tenor of Caesar's remarks. 



214 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

The advice of Silanus, consul elect, to put the conspirators 
to death, is contrasted with that of Julius Caesar, thus : 

The other [Coesar] feels that death was not appointed by the immortal 
gods for the sake of punishment, but that it is either a necessity of 
nature, or a rest from toils and miseries ; therefore wise men have never 
met it unwillingly, brave men have often encountered it even voluntarily. 
But imprisonment, and that too perpetual, was certainly invented for the 
extraordinary punishment of nefarious wickedness : therefore he propo- 
ses that they should be distributed among the municipal towns. This 
proposition seems to have in it injustice if you command it, difficulty if 
you request it ; however, let it be so decreed if you like. 

For I will undertake, and, as I hope, I shall find one who will not think 
it suitable to his dignity to refuse what you decide on for the sake of the 
universal safety. He imposes, besides, a severe punishment on the bur- 
gesses of the municipal town if any of the prisoners escape ; he sur- 
rounds them with the most terrible guard, and with every thing worthy 
of the wickedness of abandoned men. And he proposes to establish a 
decree that no one shall be able to alleviate the punishment of those 
whom he is condemning, by a vote of either the senate or the people. 
He takes away even hope, which alone can comfort men in their mis- 
eries ; besides this, he votes that their goods should be confiscated ; he 
leaves life alone to these infamous men, and if he had taken that away, 
he would have relieved them by one pang of many tortures of mind and 
body and of all the punishment of their crimes. Therefore that there 
might be some dread in life to the wicked, men of old have believed that 
there were some punishments of that sort appointed for the wicked in 
the shades below ; because in truth they perceived that if this were 
taken away death itself would not be terrible. 

Now, O conscript fathers, I see what is my interest. If you follow the 
opinion of Caius Caesar, (since he has adopted this path in the republic, 
which is accounted the popular one,) perhaps as he is the author and 
promoter of this opinion, the popular violence will be less to be dreaded 
by me. If you adopt the other opinion, I know not but I am likely to 
have more trouble. Still, let the advantage of the republic outweigh the 
consideration of my danger. For we have from Caius Caesar, as his 
own dignity and as the illustrious character of his ancestors demanded, 
a vote as a hostage of his lasting good-will to the republic. It has 
been clearly seen how great is the difference between the lenity of dem- 
agogues, and a disposition really attached to the interests of the people. 



Cicero's Oi-ations. 215 



This most gentle and merciful man does not hesitate to commit Publius 
Lentulus to eternal darkness and imprisonment, and he establishes a 
law to all posterity that no one shall be able to boast of alleviating his 
punishment, or hereafter to appear a friend of the people to the destruc- 
tion of the Roman people. He adds, also, the confiscation of their 
goods, so that want also and beggary may be added to all the torments 
of mind and body. "Wherefore, if you decide on this, you give me a com- 
panion in my address dear and acceptable to the Roman people. 

The comity proper between senators is carefully observed 
in Cicero's answer to Caesar. Nay, you feel that Cicero is 
conscious of dealing now with a man whose popular influence 
is at least to be respected, perhaps to be feared. How much 
self-control, combined with how much fine courage, was dis- 
played by Cicero, if, within himself, he indeed knew, what 
Mommsen supposes to be certainly true, that Caesar was all 
the time, by secret encouragement, in complicity with the 
conspirators! In that case, however, you cannot acquit 
Cicero of being crafty at some expense of candor. We can 
seldom be quite sure, in a great game of statesmanship or 
diplomacy, what motives behind the mask of decent appear- 
ance really work in the breasts of those engaged in it. 

We shall probably, after what we say here, make little 
return, beyond casual allusion, to the subject of Cicero as an 
orator. We wish we had room to render our presentation 
less inadequate than, as the case stands, we shall feel under 
the necessity of leaving it. The range of Cicero's eloquence 
is so wide, that adequately to represent it would require a 
whole volume as large as this. There is, however, one other 
cycle of Cicero's speeches too important in themselves, and 
too important for illustration of the orator's genius and 
character, not to be spoken of here, and exemplified in at 
least a few extracts. 

We refer to the fourteen orations that go by the name of 
the Philippics — a style of designation imitated and appro- 
priated from the famous harangues of Demosthenes against 



216 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Philip of Macedon. Cicero's Philippics were directed 
against Mark Antony. They were delivered, part of them 
to the senate, and part of them before the people, within 
the period following Julius Caesar's death during which it re- 
mained doubtful what course of public policy would be pur- 
sued by young Octavian, (Caesar Augustus,) named in Caesar's 
will as his political heir. Cicero still hoped that the des- 
tined future emperor might be induced to restore the 
republic. 

Antony meantime, who, as having been Caesar's colleague 
in nominal consulship, had succeeded to the place of chief 
actual power in the state, was manifestly taking measures to 
confirm himself in a kind of imperial usurpation. He had 
been in negotiation and collusion with the assassins — Liber- 
ators, it was the fashion to call them — but he was evidently 
beginning to revive Caesarism by such contrivances of ad- 
ministration as, for that purpose, he dared adventure upon. 
He convened the senate to confer some additional divine 
honors on the dead dictator. That day's session, Cicero, 
though specially requested by Antony to do so, did not at- 
tend. He was against the measure proposed. Antony, pro- 
voked, talked threateningly in the senate about pulling down 
the recusant ex-consul's house about his ears. 

The next day, Cicero went to the senate, and, Antony in 
his turn being absent, delivered a speech in dignified, mod- 
erate, but quite firm, opposition to Antony. Provoked again, 
Antony replied in a violent personal invective. To this, 
Cicero prudently abstained from replying in the senate ; but 
he wrote out a speech in response, which, having previously 
sent it in private to some of his friends, he finally published 
as the second philippic. This second philippic, conceived 
and composed as if addressed in immediate reply to Antony 
before the senate, constitutes what is generally esteemed the 
masterpiece of Cicero's eloquence. 

The contrast in tone, in style, in matter, which this philip- 



Cicero's Orations. 217 



pic, in common with the rest of the series, presents to the 
other orations of Cicero, not excepting even the vehement 
onslaughts upon Catiline, is more than merely strong, it is 
violent. You could hardly believe it possible for the author 
of the courtly orations for the poet Archias, for the Man- 
ilian Law, for Marcus Marcellus, to produce discourse so 
indignant, so impetuous, so direct, so hard-hitting, nay, so 
savage, as the orations against Antony. The flowing robes 
are flung off, and the orator speaks like an athlete, rather 
like a warrior, stripped to hew his antagonist to the ground. 

The simplest way, and the most obvious, would, of course, 
be to insert this second philippic entire. But, unfortunately 
for that purpose, the speech is very long, (about fifty of these 
pages); unfortunately again, and more unfortunately, it is so 
replete with local, temporary, personal allusion, that, without 
a commentary as long as itself, it would be unintelligible to 
the general reader. It must also be added that there is in 
the speech a good deal which would shock, rather than please, 
the refined modern taste. Cicero is perfectly conscious of 
the change from his customary style presented in this speech. 
He makes the change deliberately. He is resolved to deal 
with a truculent man in a sufficiently truculent manner to be 
effective. He succeeded. He succeeded too well. The 
result was finally fatal to himself. Antony felt the sting of 
Cicero's dreadful sarcasm so keenly that when, afterward, in 
disappointment of Cicero's patriotic hopes, Antony and Oc- 
tavian came to an understanding, and each, in the bloody 
proscription that followed, agreed to sacrifice his own per- 
sonal friends to the demands of the other's revenge — Cicero's 
head and hands cut off were brought, ghastly reeking gifts 
to Antony, and by him nailed up in the forum that had been 
wont to ring with the resonant voice, and to flash with the 
passionate gesture, of the orator. 

Antony was, undoubtedly, one of the most shamelessly 

profligate of men. Otherwise such accusations as Cicero 
10 



2i8 Prcpai'atory Latin Course in English. 

brought must, with his audience, have reacted against the 
bringer. 

We must content ourselves with brief citations. Here is 
the opening of the speech, [we condense by omissions :] 

To what destiny of mine, O conscript fathers, shall I say that it is 
owing, that none for the last twenty years has been an enemy to the re- 
public without at the same time declaring war against me ? Nor is 
there any necessity for naming any particular person; you yourselves rec- 
ollect instances in proof of my statement. They have all hitherto suf- 
fered severer punishments than I could have wished for them ; but I 
marvel that you, O Antonius, do not fear the end of those men whose 
conduct you are imitating. And in others I was less surprised at this. 
None of these men of former times was a voluntary enemy to me ; all 
of them were attacked by me for the sake of the republic. But you, 
who have never been injured by me, not even by a word, in order to ap- 
pear more audacious than Catiline, more frantic than Clodius, have of 
your own accord attacked me with abuse. 

Did he think that it was easiest to disparage me in the senate? a body 
which has borne its testimony in favor of many most illustrious citizens 
that they governed the republic well, but in favor of me alone, of all 
men, that I preserved it. Or did he wish to contend with me in a ri- 
valry of eloquence? This, indeed, is an act of generosity ! for what 
could be a more fertile or richer subject for me than to have to speak in 
defense of myself, and against Antonius ? 

In that complaint, [Cicero's first philippic,] mournful indeed and misera- 
ble, but still unavoidable for a man of that rank in which the senate and 
people of Rome have placed me, what did I say that was insulting ? that 
was otherwise than moderate ? that was otherwise than friendly? and 
what instance was it not of moderation to complain of the conduct of 
Marcus Antonius, and yet to abstain from any abusive expressions ? es- 
pecially when you had scattered abroad all relics of the republic ; when 
every thing was on sale at your house by the most infamous traffic ; when 
you confessed that those laws which had never been promulgated had 
been passed with reference to you, and by you ; when you, being augur, 
had abolished the auspices, being consul, had taken away the power of 
interposing the veto ; when you were escorted in the most shameful 
manner by armed guards ; when, worn out with drunkenness and de- 
bauchery, you were every day performing all sorts of obscenities in that 



Cicero's Orations. 2ig 



chaste house of yours. But I, as if I had to contend against Marcus 
Crassus, with whom I have had many severe struggles, and not with a 
most worthless gladiator, while complaining in dignified language of 
the state of the republic, did not say one word which could be called 
personal. Therefore, to-day I will make him understand with what 
great kindness he was then treated by me. 

Since, O conscript fathers, I have many things which I may say both in 
my own defense and against Marcus Antonius, one thing I ask you, that 
you will listen to me with kindness while I am speaking for myself ; the 
other I will insure myself, namely, that you shall listen to me with 
attention while speaking against him. At the same time also, I beg 
this of you : that if you have been acquainted with my moderation and 
modesty throughout my whole life, and especially as a speaker, you will 
not, when to-day I answer this man in the spirit in which he has at- 
tacked me, think that I have forgotten my usual character. I will not 
treat him as a consul, for he did not treat me as a man of consular rank ; 
and although he in no respect deserves to be considered a consul, 
whether we regard his way of life, or his principle of governing the re- 
public, or the manner in which he was elected, I am beyond all dis- 
pute a man of consular rank. 

On one occasion, [addressed directly as to Antony,] you attempted 
even to be witty. O ye good gods, how little did that attempt suit you ! 
And yet you are a little to be blamed for your failure in that instance, 
too. For you might have got some wit from your wife, who was an 
actress. "Arms to the gown must yield." \Cedant anna togoz — "let 
military yield to civil power." This is a bit of verse from Cicero him- 
self ; Antony had evidently been rallying his antagonist on it ; Cicero 
meant it in praise of his own exploits.] Well, have they not yielded ? 
But afterward the gown yielded to your arms. Let us inquire, then, 
whether it was better for the arms of wicked men to yield to the free- 
dom of the Roman people, or that our liberty should yield to your 
arms. Nor will I make any further reply to you about the verses. I will 
only say briefly that you do not understand them, nor any other litera- 
ture whatever. 

The free and frequent change, on Cicero's part, from ad- 
dressing the senate to addressing Antony, indicates the 
highly dramatic play of delivery in which the orator must 
have been accustomed to indulge. Antony, it seems, in- 



Preparatory Latin Course in Eiiglish. 



culpated Cicero as in complicity with the assassins of Csesar. 
Cicero points out the inconsistency of Antony's praising, as 
Antony did, the conspirators, and, at the same time, blaming 
Cicero. Cicero, however, shows, as to himself, that though 
he approved the deed when the deed had been done, he 
could have had no part in the doing of the deed, since, 
were it otherwise, his name must have been associated with 
it in the popular fame of so illustrious an exploit. Evidently, 
at that point of time, it was the prevailing opinion at Rome 
that Caesar's murder was a praiseworthy act of liberation for 
the state. Cicero goes over Antony's life and finds abundant 
matter of invective : 

Let us speak of his meaner descriptions of worthlessness. You, 
with those jaws of yours, and those sides of yours, and that strength of 
body suited to a gladiator, drank such quantities of wine at the mar- 
riage of Hippia, that you were forced to vomit the next day in the sight 
of the Roman people. O action disgraceful not merely to see, but even 
to hear of! If this had happened to you at supper amid those vast 
drinking-cups of yours who would not have thought it scandalous ? But 
in an assembly of the Roman people, a man holding a public office, a 
master of the horse, to whom it would have been disgraceful even to 
belch, vomiting filled his own bosom and the whole tribunal with frag- 
ments of what he had been eating reeking with wine. 

Cicero comes to an incident in Antony's career the men- 
tion of which, as the author's lively imagination prompts him, 
writing in his closet, to suppose, makes Antony start : 

He does not dissemble, O conscript fathers ; it is plain that he is 
agitated ; he perspires ; he turns pale. Let him do what he pleases, 
provided he is not sick, and does not behave as he did in the Minucian 
colonnade. . . . Your colleague [Julius Caesar] was sitting in the 
rostra, clothed in a purple robe, on a golden chair, wearing a crown. 
You mount the steps ; you approach his chair, (if you were a priest of 
Pan, you ought to have recollected that you were consul too ; ) you dis- 
play a diadem. There is a groan over the whole forum. Where did 
the diadem come from ? For you had not picked it up when lying on 
the ground, but you had brought it from home with you, a premeditated 



Cicero's Orations. 



and deliberately planned wickedness. You placed the diadem on his 
head amid the groans of the people ; he rejected it amid great applause. 
You then alone, O wicked man, were found, both to advise the assump- 
tion of kingly power, and to wish to have him for your master who was 
your colleague ; and also to try what the Roman people might be able to 
bear and to endure. Moreover, you even sought to move his pity ; you 
threw yourself at his feet as a suppliant ; begging for what ? to be a 
slave ? You might beg it for yourself, when you had lived in such a 
way from the time that you were a boy that you could bear every thing, 
and would find no difficulty in being a slave ; but certainly you had no 
commission from the Roman people to try for such a thing for them. 

O how splendid was that eloquence of yours, when you harangued the 
people stark naked! What could be more foul than this? more 
shameful than this? more deserving of eveiy sort of punishment ? Are 
you waiting for me to prick you more ? This that I am saying must 
tear you and bring blood enough, if you have any feeling at all. I am 
afraid that I may be detracting from the glory of some most eminent 
men. Still my indignation shall find a voice. What can be more scan- 
dalous than for that man to live who placed a diadem on a man's head, 
when every one confesses that that man was deservedly slain who re- 
jected it ? And, moreover, he caused it to be recorded in the annals, 
under the head of Lupercalia, "That Marcus Antonius, the consul, by 
command of the people, had offered the kingdom to Caius Caesar, per- 
petual dictator ; and that Caesar had refused to accept it." 

Cicero again alludes to the killing of Cassar : 

The name of peace is sweet; the thing itself is most salutary. But 
between peace and slavery there is a wide difference. Peace is liberty 
in tranquillity ; slavery is the worst of all evils — to be repelled, if need 
be, not only by war, but even by death. But if those deliverers of ours 
have taken themselves away out of our sight, still they have left behind 
the example of their conduct. They have done what no one else had 
done. Brutus pursued Tarquinius with war, who was a king when it 
was lawful for a king to exist in Rome. Spurius Cassius, Spurius 
Maelius, and Marcus Manlius were all slain because they were suspected 
of aiming at regal power. These are the first men who have ever vent- 
ured to attack, sword in hand, a man not aiming at regal power, but 
actually reigning. And their action is not only of itself a glorious and 
godlike exploit, but it is also one put forth for our imitation ; especially 
since by it they have acquired such glory as appears hardly to be 
bounded by heaven itself. For although in the very consciousness of a 



222 Pi-eparatory Latin Course in English. 

glorious action there is a certain reward, still I do not consider immor- 
tality of glory a thing to be despised by one who is himself mortal. 

Contrasting Antony with Julius Caesar, Cicero says : 

In that man were combined genius, method, memory, literature, pru- 
dence, deliberation, and industry. He had performed exploits in war 
which, though calamitous for the republic, were nevertheless mighty 
deeds. Having for many years aimed at being a king, he had with 
great labor, and much personal danger, accomplished what he intended. 
He had conciliated the ignorant multitude by presents, by monuments, 
by largesses of food, and by banquets ; he had bound his own party to 
him by rewards, his adversaries by the appearances of clemency. Why 
need I say much on such a subject? He had already brought a free 
city, partly by fear, partly by patience, into a habit of slavery. 

With him I can, indeed, compare you as to your desire to reign ; but 
in all other respects you are in no degree to be compared to him. 
But from the many evils which by him have been burned into the re- 
public there is still this good, that the Roman people has now learned 
how much to believe every one, to whom to trust itself, and against 
whom to guard. Do you never think on these things? And do you 
not understand that it is enough for brave men to have learned how no- 
ble a thing it is as to the act, how grateful it is as to the benefit done, 
how glorious as to the fame acquired, to slay a tyrant? When men 
could not bear him, do you think they will bear you ? Believe me, the 
time will come when men will race with one another to do this deed, 
and when no one will wait for the tardy arrival of an opportunity. 

Consider, I beg you, Marcus Antonius, do some time or other con- 
sider the republic : think of the family of which you are born, not of 
the men with whom you are living. Be reconciled to the republic. 
However, do you decide on your conduct. As to mine, I myself will 
declare what that shall be. I defended the republic as a young man ; I 
will not abandon it now when I am old. I scorned the sword of Cati- 
line; I will not quail before yours. No, I will rather cheerfully expose 
my own person, if the liberty of the city can be restored by my death. 

May the indignation of the Roman people at last bring forth what it has 
been so long laboring with. In truth, if twenty years ago in this very tem- 
ple I asserted that death could not come prematurely upon a man of con- 
sular rank, with how much more truth must I now say the same of an 
old man ? To me, indeed, O conscript fathers, death is now even de- 
sirable, after all the honors which I have gained, and the deeds which I 
have done. I only pray for these two things : One, that dying I may leave 



Cicero's Orations. 223 



the Roman people free. No greater boon than this can be granted me 
by the immortal gods. The other, that every one may meet with a fate 
suitable to his deserts and conduct toward the republic. 

Thus the second philippic of Cicero ends. And with this 
selection of extracts ends our imperfect presentation to our 
readers of Cicero the orator. 

By way of general retrospect and appreciation, see what 
our own great jurist and orator, Rufus Choate, says of Cicero 
and of Cicero's philippics. Mr. Choate is speaking on the 
general subject of " The Eloquence of Revolutionary Pe- 
riods." The allusion to Cicero comes in as an important 
illustration of the orator's theme. Mr. Choate, in our cita- 
tion, begins with presenting a useful foil of contrast to 
Cicero in the person and character of Julius Caesar : 

" Easy is it and tempting for the Merivales and Congreves 
(I am sorry to see De Quincey in such company) to say the 
senate and people of Rome were unfit to rule the world they 
had overrun ; and, therefore, it was needful for an emperor 
and his guard and his legions to step in ; easy and tempting 
is such a speculation, because nobody can disprove it, and 
it sounds of philosophy, seems to be new. . . . 

" How soothing and elevating to turn from such philoso- 
phy, falsely so called, to the grand and stirring music of that 
eloquence — those last fourteen pleadings of Cicero, [the 
philippics,] which he who has not studied knows nothing of 
the orator, nothing of the patriot — in which the Roman lib- 
erty breathed its last. From that purer eloquence, from 
that nobler orator, the great trial of fire and blood through 
which the spirit of Rome was passing had burned and 
purged away all things light, all things gross ; the purple robe, 
the superb attitude and action, the splendid commonplaces 
of a festal rhetoric, are all laid by; the ungraceful, occa- 
sional vanity of adulation, the elaborate speech of the abun- 
dant, happy mind, at its ease, all disappear; and, instead, 
what directness, what plainness, what rapidity, what fire, 



224 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

what abnegation of himself, what disdain, what hate of 
the usurper and the usurpation, what grand, swelling senti- 
ments, what fine raptures of liberty, roll and revel there ! 
How there rise above and from out that impetuous torrent of 
speech, rushing fervidly, audibly, distinctly, between the 
peals of that thunder with which, like a guardian divinity, 
he seems to keep the senate-house, and the forum where the 
people assembled, unprofaned by the impending tyranny — 
how there rise, here and there, those tones, so sweet, so 
mournful, boding, and prophetic of the end ! . . . The alter- 
native of his own certain death, if the republic fell resisting 
— what pathos, what dignity, what sincerity, what merit in- 
trinsical, it gives to his brave counsels of resistance ! " [Mr. 
Choate at this point enters without notice upon a magnifi- 
cent version, his own, no doubt, of a representative passage 
of Cicero's patriot oratory, as follows :] 

Lay hold on this opportunity of our salvation, conscript fathers — by the 
immortal gods I conjure you ! — and remember that you are the foremost 
men here, in the council-chamber of the whole earth. Give one sign 
to the Roman people that even as now they pledge their valor, so you 
pledge your wisdom to the crisis of the state. But what need that I 
exhort you ? Is there one so insensate as not to understand that if we 
sleep over an occasion such as this, it is ours to bow our necks to a 
tyranny not proud and cruel only, but ignominous — but sinful? Do ye 
not know this Antony? Do ye not know his companions? Do ye not 
know his whole house — insolent, — impure, — gamesters, — drunkards? 
To be slaves to such as he, to such as these, were it not the fullest 
measure of misery, conjoined with the fullest measure of disgrace ? If 
it be so — may the gods avert the omen — that the supreme hour of the 
republic has come, let us, the rulers of the world, rather fall with honor, 
than serve with infamy ! Born to glory and to liberty, let us hold these 
bright distinctions fast, or let us greatly die ! Be it, Romans, our first 
resolve to strike down the tyrant and the tyranny. Be it our second to 
endure all things for the honor and liberty of our country. To submit 
to infamy for the love of life can never come within the contemplation 
of a Roman soul ! For you, the people of Rome — you, whom the gods 
have appointed to rule the world — for you to own a master is impious. 



Cicero's Orations, 225 



You are in the last crisis of nations. To be free or to be slaves — that 
is the question of the hour. By every obligation of man or states it 
behooves you in this extremity to conquer — as your devotion to the gods 
and your concord among yourselves encourage you to hope — or to bear 
all things but slavery. Other nations may bend to servitude ; the birth- 
right and the distinction of the people of Rome is liberty. 

The rendering which Choate thus gives of a passage of 
Cicero may serve to show what a different power there is in 
Cicero's eloquence according as he is translated or not by a 
man with the sense in him, and the capacity, of style. 



VIII. 
VI RGI L, 



Next to the Iliad of Homer, and hardly second to that, 
the ^Eneid of Virgil is the most famous of poems. The 
two poems, like the two poets, are joined forever in an in- 
separable comparison, contrast, and fellowship of fame. It 
would, however, be right that Homer's Odyssey, not less than 
his Iliad, should be associated in thought with the ^Eneid of 
Virgil. For the ^neid partakes quite as much of the 
character of the Odyssey, as it does of the character of the 
Iliad. It is, in fact, a composite reproduction of both those 
poems, Virgil's poetic invention consisting rather in a cun- 
ning of composition and harmony to blend the Iliad and the 
Odyssey into one new whole, an authentic creation of the 
Roman poet's proper genius — Virgil's invention, we say, 
consisting rather in this, than in power to produce really 
original material of his own. 

But though thus there is little in the ^Eneid that was not first 

in either the Odyssey or the Iliad, still, Virgil is no plagiarist, 

and he is no mere copyist. He is a great individual poet, 

to whom Homer was as the rest of the universe, namely, a 

10* 



226 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



vast free treasure-house of material and resource for his 
work. He went to the Iliad and the Odyssey for what he 
wanted ; but he, in doing so, no more conceived of himself as 
purloining from Homer, or even as dependently and slavishly 
copying Homer, than he would have conceived of himself as 
unworthily subservient, in a similar relation, to Nature her- 



./^ 




VIRGIL. 



self, or to the history of mankind, if he had from these 
sources alone drawn all his matter and all his inspiration. 
Homer was already to Virgil a far-off, half-impersonal poet, 
hardly more than a name, to whom there could be no rela- 
tion of debt worth considering, and whose works were so 
much a universal volume of poetry that to take from him 



Virgil. 227 



what you needed for your verse was a quite unquestiona- 
ble matter of course. The present writer remembers once 
seeing Mr. Charles Sumner taken seriously to task for pla- 
giarizing from Demosthenes; because, forsooth, in that fond- 
ness for classic tincture to his style which was an infirmity 
with this New England rhetorican, he introduced, in a sena- 
torial speech of his, an elaborate adaptation of one of the 
most famous passages of the Greek's great Oration for the 
Crown. The fact is, Mr. Sumner was in this so far from 
being conscious to himself of any dishonorable conveyance of 
the Demosthenean eloquence, that it would have disappointed 
him rather not to have his literary art, in the use he thus 
made of his Greek, recognized by his hearers or his readers. 
Just so an Homeric story in Virgil was a thing for the Roman 
poet not to be ashamed of, but to be proud of. The portrait- 
painter Stuart would as soon have been mortified to be told 
concerning a picture of his, "Why, that is Washington," as 
would have been Virgil, to be told, "Why, you got that from 
Homer." In either case the artist would have smiled, and 
said, " I am glad you think it is like." 

The literary history of the ^Eneid is remarkable. There 
has happened no parenthesis of neglect in the long sentence 
of study and approval which posterity has pronounced upon 
his genius and his fame. There was a time when Homer 
was forgotten, to be afterward revived in recollection, with 
the revival of Greek letters. But Virgil, if, during the ages 
which we call dark, he was not a poet to men, was in com- 
pensation a magician. A kind of unconscious blind poetry 
it was in itself, this mediaeval metamorphosis of Virgil into a 
magician from a poet. For is not the poet — any poet, we 
mean — poetically conceived, a true magician ? The most 
marvelous feats of magic were attributed to the power of 
Virgil. He was said to have built at Rome for Augustus, 
his imperial patron, a tower furnished with figures emblem- 
atic of the imperial provinces, each figure holding in its 



p7'€paratory Latin Course in English. 



hand a bell that would strike a spontaneous alarm whenever 
a revolt occurred in the province to which that particular 
figure appertained. This magical tower contained, besides, a 
mirror that would do for the eye what the bells did for the 
ear — it would show an image of the enemies of Rome, just as 
they appeared at any time in hostile array against the empire. 
Another mirror was more magical still. This mirror would 
reveal in reflection the secret guilt of any citizen of Rome. 
There are many other curious mediaeval legends of Virgilius 
the magician. Perhaps Virgil himself is responsible for the 
transformation which popular superstition thus caused him 
to undergo. There is in one of his minor poems a mention 
made of magical arts — sufficient, perhaps, to become the 
fruitful germ of suggestion. The poem referred to is the 
eighth pastoral, and the magical arts consist of the repeated 
spells furnished by an enchantress to win the heart of a 
reluctant lover. 

The history of Virgil's poetry is in great part the history 
of a singularly potent literary influence. Almost all readers 
know something of the relation between Virgil and Dante. 
The Florentine poet makes Virgil serve him as guide and 
master through all that strange imaginative experience of his 
in visiting hell and purgatory which he describes in his 
Inferno and Purgatorio — the first two parts of the " Divina 
Commedia." Dante stood in time close upon the hither con- 
fines of the Dark Ages. It is, perhaps, not absurd to imagine, 
that it was scarcely less Virgil's capacity of magician, than 
his capacity of poet, that first suggested to Dante his selec- 
tion of Virgil as of all men the man to conduct and instruct 
amid the mysteries of the unseen world. The honor is well- 
nigh, if not quite, unique, that Virgil enjoys in being looked 
up to as superior by a genius that certainly was superior to 
him. For Dante's order of mind was loftier than was that of 
Virgil. It is Virgil's good fortune, not less than it is his 
merit, that he is so safely and so universally famous. Or 



Virgil. 229 

possibly his fame belongs in part to the man as distinct from 
the poet. For Virgil had what has been called the genius 
to be loved. 

This simple fact about his character, that he was lovable, 
together with the complementary fact about his life, that he 
was loved, is the most important thing that we know of 
Virgil the man. He was born (70 B.C.) a country boy in 
the hamlet of Andes, (Northern Italy,) near Mantua, whence 
1" the Mantuan " has become a designation for him. (Mr. Col- 
lins, editor of the Ancient Classics for English Readers, a 
series of books often praised in these pages, has himself pre- 
pared the volume on Virgil. It is curious, unaccountable 
indeed, that this careful writer should have suffered himself 
to say concerning Virgil, that " the emperor under whom he 
was born was that Octavianus Csesar, nephew of the great 
Julius, whose title of ' Augustus,' " etc. — the fact being that 
Virgil was born seven years before even the birth of Augustus 
Csesar. Another strange slip is Mr. Collins's allusion to cer- 
tain " legionaries who had fought for Antony and young 
Octavianus against Pompey." There was, of course, no fight- 
ing done for "Antony and young Octavianus," until after 
the death of Julius Caesar ; and before the death of Julius 
Caesar, Pompey himself had been murdered. The fighting 
referred to, therefore, could not have been against Pompey. 
It is hard for any writer to commit himself in unnumbered 
statements of fact and never go wrong.) Virgil grew to 
early manhood in the rustic region of his birth. His little 
farm was not little enough to escape confiscation when the 
discharged legionaries of Octavius (Augustus) were to be 
furnished with settlements of land to keep them quiet and 
contented. Virgil had already won some friend at court 
who now proved influential enough to get back again for him, 
from the grace of Augustus, his confiscated patrimony. No 
wonder the grateful poet felt like praising his imperial pa- 
tron in verse ; and the interceding friend, Pollio, if Pollio 



230 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

was he, is made secuiely immortal in recompense of his 
service. For, as Milton sings it of himself — with noble ego- 
tism justified by both the genius and the character of the 
singer — so Virgil, too, might have sung: 

He can requite thee, for he knows the channs 
That call fame on such gentle acts as these, 
And he can spread thy name o'er lands and seas, 

Whatever clime the sun's bright circle warms. 

The most celebrated of all Virgil's minor poems is known 
by the name of Pollio, supposed to have been the poet's 
friend in need. 

It shows the terms on which victorious Roman emperors 
held their empire, that Virgil, bringing back from Rome an 
imperial edict that authorized him to recover his farm, was 
resisted by the soldier occupant, and obliged to swim the 
Mincius to save his life. A second visit of Virgil to Rome 
in prosecution of his right resulted in his becoming a 
resident of that city. Not improbably Augustus found 
it more convenient to give his grace to Virgil some other 
form of bounty, than the restoration of that farm en- 
forced against the turbulent protest of his disappointed 
legionary. 

There is a pretty story told of Virgil's composing a couplet 
of verses in praise of the emperor, and posting them secretly 
and anonymously on the palace gate. Augustus, having had 
the good taste to be pleased with the lines, made an effort to 
discover the author. Virgil's modesty kept him in the back- 
ground, until some unscrupulous fellow thought it safe to claim 
the verses for his own. The impostor was handsomely re- 
warded. Virgil at this was so much vexed that he took 
measures to redress himself. With all his modesty and all 
his genius, Virgil seems not to have wanted a certain thrifty 
knack for making his way in the world. His present con- 
trivance, however, was the contrivance of a poet, as well as 



Virgil. 231 

of a man of sense. Under the original distich he wrote an 
additional verse, running 

I made these lines, another took the praise, 

together with the first words of a verse to follow — which 
same first words were written four times, in form and order 
as if beginning four successive verses purposely left unfin- 
ished. Here was a puzzle and a mystery. Augustus con- 
descended to require that the lines should be completed. 
Several attempts to complete them ignominiously failed. 
Virgil at last revealed himself as the author, and finished the 
lines. They read as follows : 

Thus you not for yourselves build nests, O birds ; 
Thus you not for yourselves bear fleeces, flocks ; 
Thus you not for yourselves make honey, bees ; 
Thus you not for yourselves draw plows, O oxen. 

The neat symmetrical look of the verses is necessarily lost 
in an English rendering. It is needless to say that the for- 
tune of the poet was made. 

Virgil is said to have been shy, awkward, retiring in so- 
ciety. He and the poet Horace were excellent friends, but 
that did not prevent so accomplished a man of the world as 
Horace from appreciating the country effect of Virgil in a 
drawing-room. It is guessed that Horace alludes loyally to 
this in one of his satires, where, without naming any one, he 
praises a friend of his for the worth disguised by him under 
an uncouth exterior. 

Virgil was, it is believed, a man of exceptionally pure life, 
for a Roman of his time. His poetry agrees with this esti- 
mate of his morals. Toward the close of his life, he lived 
chiefly at Naples, Par-then'-o-pe, as it used to be called. 
(Wordsworth, in his magnificent sonnet of farewell and god- 
speed to Sir Walter Scott starting on his last melancholy 
voyage to Italy for his health, finely used the name Parthen- 
ope to close the closing line of the poem.) He ended his 



232 Preparatory Lati)i Course in English. 

peaceful and prosperous life in his fifty-first year, a very well- 
to-do man. He was buried, according to Roman custom, by 
the wayside. They still point out the spot to the tourist. It 
lies on the road leading to Pu-te'o-li, out from Naples. 

Virgil's works consist of three classes of poems. The or- 
der of production must be exactly inverted to give the order 
of comparative importance. That is, Virgil's poetic achieve- 
ment formed a regular climax to its close. He was still, 
after finishing the y£neid, younger than Milton was when 
he began his Paradise Lost. Finishing, we say ; but, accord- 
ing to the poet's own standard, the y£neid never was fin- 
ished. It is even reported that one of his parting directions 
was to have his manuscript of the poem burned. Augustus 
intervened to prevent the act of destruction. The text 
exhibits here and there an unfinished line. In short, the 
artist's last touches the poem never received ; but the most 
of the poem is in a state requring from the artist no last 
touches to improve it. 

We had better let our own order of treatment follow 
Virgil's order of production. Take notice, however, kind 
reader, that the average course of preparation for college in- 
cludes from Virgil only about six books of the ^Eneid. What, 
therefore, we give of the other poetry of Virgil will be so 
much over and above. First, then, of Virgil's pastoral 
poems. 

These are called sometimes bucolics, (Greek for " pas- 
torals," which latter term is Latin,) and sometimes eclogues, 
(Greek for "select pieces.") There are in all ten eclogues 
of Virgil now extant. They vary somewhat in length, aver- 
aging about eighty lines each. They are written in the 
same meter as that of the ^Eneid, dactylic hexameter. The 
idea of such poems is derived from a Greek original. The- 
ocritus in particular was Virgil's master in this species of 
composition. The pupil, however, puts into some of his 
eclogues what he found no hint of anywhere in his master. 



Virgil. 233 

This is pre-eminently the case with the "Pollio," so called, 
which we shall by and by present in full. 

In general, the eclogues presuppose a Utopian pastoral 
life ; that is, a life such as never really existed anywhere, cer- 
tainly not in Italy. The scenery and the circumstance are 
made up partly from the Greek Arcadia, partly from rural 
Italy, but chiefly from the poet's imagination. Shepherds, 
cultivated in music and poetry, tend their flocks and spend 
their time alternately in love-making and in matches of verse 
or of song. Grant the poet his world, which never was, 
which, indeed, never could be, and his poetry is fine. Virgil 
contrives to weave into his verse some compliments,, sincere, 
no doubt, but thrifty all the same, to his friends, especially to 
his imperial friend, Augustus. We will be frank with our 
readers, and fairly tell them that they would not be greatly 
interested in Virgil's eclogues spread out before them at 
any considerable length. They are highly artificial literary 
forms, dependent for currency upon temporary and local 
vogue. And the vogue, at least among us, has. passed, for 
such poems as these. Tennyson's pastorals, the " Gardener's 
Daughter," for instance, are intrinsically far more interesting, 
and far more valuable, as far more genuine, than Virgil's 
eclogues. Still, interested or not in these productions for 
their own sake, you will certainly be interested in them as 
celebrated pieces of literature. 

The most celebrated among them all is, as we have said, 
the " Pollio," but that happens to be also the piece least 
truly pastoral in its quality. However — nay, for that very 
reason — it is at the same time the most highly characteristic, 
not, to be sure, of the eclogues as bucolics, but of the 
eclogues as purely conventional productions of an artificial 
age, and of a true poet rendered artificial by the influences 
surrounding him. 

Our readers would find pleasure in comparing with Vir- 
gil's eclogues some imitative pastorals written by Pope at 



234 Preparatory Lati?i Course in English. 

sixteen years of age. Read these, you that have the 
leisure. 

The fourth pastoral, or the " Pollio,".* has for ostensible 
subject the birth of a marvelous boy, variously supposed to 
be son of Antony, son of Pollio, son of Augustus — even, by re- 
trospective license on the poet's part, to be Augustus himself. 
The terms of allusion to this offspring, and of description of a 
blessed state of things to accompany and follow his birth, are, 
at points, singularly coincident with prophecies of Holy Writ 
concerning Jesus. The date of the poem is startlingly near 
that of the nativity of our Saviour. One can easily conceive 
in reading it that we have here an articulate utterance of the 
unconscious desire of all nations for a Redeemer. In it, the 
Sibyl is spoken of by Virgil as having foretold this happy 
age. Fragments still exist alleged to be authentic parts of 
the Sibylline oracles. But we cannot be sure. Those or- 
acles, whatever they originally were, have been tampered 
with, for reasons of state and of church, until nothing of 
them remains that is unquestionably genuine. That old 
Latin hymn, so familiar to us all, the Dies Irae, has a line, 
Teste David cum Sibylla, 

— David, along with the Sibyl, bearing witness — which keeps 
the idea of a Sibylline prophecy concerning Jesus fresh in 
modern recollection. Cuma was the Sibyl's dwelling-place. 

Here, then, is Virgil's " Pollio." We use the prose trans- 
lation of Professor Conington, of whose fruitful labors on 
Virgil we shall hereafter speak. The Muses of Sicily, you 
will observe, are invoked. Virgil thus acknowledges, or 
rather proclaims, that he derives his pastoral verse from 
Theocritus, a Sicilian Greek, of Syracuse: 

Pollio. 

Muses of Sicily, let us strike a somewhat louder chord. It is not for 
all that plantations have charms, or groundling tamarisks. If we are to 
sing of the woodland, let the woodland rise to a consul's dignity. 



Virgil. 235 

The last era of the song of Cuma has come at length : the grand file 
of the ages is being born anew ; at length the virgin is returning to the 
reign of Saturn ; at length a new generation is descending from heaven 
on high. Do but thou smile thy pure smile on the birth of the boy who 
shall at last bring the race of iron to an end, and bid the golden race 
spring up all the world over — thou Lucina — thine own Apollo is at 
length on his throne. In thy consulship it is — in thine, Pollio — that this 
glorious time shall come on, and the mighty months begin their march. 
Under thy conduct, any remaining trace of our national guilt shall be- 
come void, and release the world from the thraldom of perpetual fear. 
He shall have the life of the gods conferred on him, and shall see gods 
and heroes mixing together, and shall himself be seen of them, and with 
his father's virtues shall govern a world at peace. 

For thee, sweet boy, the earth, of her own unforced will, shall pour 
forth a child's first presents — gadding ivy and foxglove everywhere, 
and Egyptian bean blending with the bright smiling acanthus. Of 
themselves, the goats shall carry home uddei-s distended with milk ; 
nor shall the herds fear huge lions in the way. Of itself, thy grassy 
cradle shall pour out flowers to caress thee. Death to the serpent, 
and to the treacherous plant of poisoned juice. Assyrian spices shall 
spring up by the wayside. 

But soon as thou shalt be of an age to read at length of the glories of 
heroes and thy father's deeds, and to acquaint thyself with the nature of 
manly work, the yellow of the waving corn shall steal gradually over 
the plain, and from briers, that know naught of culture, grapes shall 
hang in purple clusters, and the stubborn heart of oak shall exude dews of 
honey. Still, under all this show, some few traces shall remain of the sin 
and guile of old — such as may prompt men to defy the ocean goddess 
with their ships, to build towns with walls around them, to cleave furrows 
in the soil of earth. A second Tiphys shall there be in those days — a 
second Argo to convey the flower of chivalry ; a second war of heroes, 
too, shall there be, and a second time shall Achilles be sent in his great- 
ness to Troy. 

Afterward, when ripe years have at length made thee man, even the 
peaceful sailor shall leave the sea, nor shall the good ship of pine ex- 
change merchandise — all lands shall produce all things, the ground 
shall not feel the harrow, nor the vineyard the pruning-hook ; the sturdy 
plowman, too, shall at length set his bullocks free from the yoke ; 
nor shall wool be taught to counterfeit varied hues, but of himself, as he 
feeds in the meadows, the ram shall transform his fleece, now into a 
lovely purple dye, now into saffron-yellow — of its own will, scarlet shall 



236 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

clothe the lambs as they graze. Ages like these, flow on ! — so cried to 
their spindles the Fates, uttering in concert the fixed will of destiny. 

Assume thine august dignities — the time is at length at hand — thou 
best-loved offspring of the gods, august scion of Jove ! Look upon the 
world as it totters beneath the mass of its overhanging dome — earth and 
the expanse of sea and the deep of heaven — look how all are rejoic- 
ing in the age that is to be ! O may my life's last days last long enough, 
and breath be granted me enough to tell of thy deeds ! I will be o'er- 
matched in song by none — not by Orpheus of Thrace, nor by Linus 
though that were backed by his mother, and this by his father — Or'pheus 
by Cal-li'o-pe, Linus by Apollo in his beauty. Were Pan himself, with 
Arcady looking on, to enter the lists with me, Pan himself, with Arcady 
looking on, should own himself vanquished. 

Begin, sweet child, with a smile, to take notice of thy mother. . . . 

There is a famous parallel, or paraphrase, or imitation, 
of the " Pollio," written in English heroics by Pope. 
This intentional and avowed imitation has the express pur- 
pose to point out the resemblances, so interesting to the 
modern and Christian reader, between the profane poet 
Virgil, and the sacred prophet Isaiah. Pope accompanies 
his poem (originally published in Addison's " Spectator ") 
with entertaining and instructive commentary, which readers 
having access to it would do well to examine. Pope's title 
is, " Messiah, a Sacred Eclogue. In imitation of Virgil's 
Pollio." 

In the Georgics, we have a poem on farming. The title 
itself, Georgics, means farming, from ge (Greek for ' earth,' 
appearing in geography, geology, geometry) and ergo, (an old 
Greek root, meaning ' work.') The object of the poem was to 
encourage agricultural pursuits. Augustus desired that the 
empire should be peace, and he wanted to see every sword 
turned into a sickle — that is, every sword but his own. It is 
doubtful if Virgil's Georgics ever made many men farmers, 
or made many farmers better farmers than they were before. 
The theory and practice of farming exhibited are hardly up 
to the mark of the present scientific times. Quite probably, 



Virgil. 237 

too, the farmers of Virgil's own day might have criticised 
the poet's suggestions at points. However, there is much 
good sense in the poem, mingled with much superstition. 
The tenor of didactics is pleasantly interrupted by occasional 
episode. 

The Georgics are divided into four books. (The verse is 
dactylic hexameter.) The first book treats of raising what 
English people call corn, and we Americans call grain, or, 
in commercial dialect, cereal crops. The second book has 
the culture of fruits, especially of the grape, for its subject. 
The third book deals with the breeding and treatment of 
farm animals. The fourth book is given up to the topic of 
the management of bees. An aggressive religious earnest- 
ness appears throughout, animating the author, as it were 
out of time. 

Virgil, in his Georgics, as in all his other poetry, follows 
Greek originals. Hesiod — in antiquity and in traditionary 
character, to be associated with Homer — has a poem, not very 
poetical, entitled " Works and Days," in which, after giving 
a legendary account of the history of the earth, he proceeds 
to furnish farmers with practical suggestions about their 
husbandry. Virgil draws from Hesiod. To other Greek 
authors Virgil owes an obligation, the extent of which it is no 
longer possible to estimate. When we come, in a succeed- 
ing volume, to speak of Lucretius, it may fall in our way to 
point out how Virgil, in the Georgics, found that philosoph- 
ical Roman poet also an inspiration to his genius. 

We give the opening lines, containing, first, what might be 
called the argument and dedication, and, secondly, the invo- 
cation. We use Dryden's version — iambic pentameters, or 
heroics, varied from uniformity by triplets, frequently re- 
placing couplets, of lines, and by Alexandrines occurring at 
irregular intervals, whether sometimes through defect of ear 
in the rhymer, or always in the exercise of conscious art on 
his part, it might be a doubtful matter to determine. The 



238 Preparatory Lati?i Course in English. 

brevity and simplicity of the argument, as also of the dedi- 
cation, are admirable in the original. The length and mul- 
tiplicity, to say nothing of the adulatory blasphemy, of the 
invocation, are to be admired, if admired at all, rather for 
the ingenuity which they afford opportunity to display, than 
for any merit of a higher sort exhibited. The idea of the 
poet seems to have been to muster into his prayer as many 
of the national divinities as could in any way be associated 
with farming, and then to cap his climax with a sweetmeat 
of compliment to Augustus as large and as rich as the impe- 
rial stomach could be supposed equal to digesting. Whether 
the genius of the flatterer succeeded in sating the appetite 
of the flattered, our readers shall be left to guess each one 
for himself. Here are the lines : 

What makes a plenteous harvest, when to turn 
The fruitful soil, and when to sow the corn ; 
The care of sheep, of oxen, and of kine ; 
And how to raise on elms the teeming vine; 
The birth and genius of the frugal bee, 
I sing, Maecenas, and I sing to thee. 

Ye deities ! who fields and plains protect, 
Who rule the seasons, and the year direct, 
Bacchus and fostering Ceres, powers divine, 
Who gave us corn for mast, for water, wine — 
Ye Fauns, propitious to the rural swains, 
Ye Nymphs that haunt the mountains and the plains, 
Join in my work, and to my numbers bring 
Your needful succor ; for your gifts I sing. 
And thou, whose trident struck the teeming earth, 
And made a passage for the courser's birth ; 
And thou, for whom the Cean shore sustains 
The milky herds, that graze the flowery plains ; 
And thou the shepherds' tutelaiy god, 
Leave, for a while, O Pan, thy loved abode ; 
And, if Arcadian fleeces be thy care, 
From fields and mountains to my song repair. 
Inventor, Pallas, of the fattening oil, 
Thou founder of the plow and plowman's toil ; 
And thou, whose hands the shroud-like cypress rear, 
Come, all ye gods and goddesses, that wear 
The rural honors, and increase the year ; 
You who supply the ground with seeds of grain ; 
And you, who swell those seeds with kindly rain ; 



Virgil. 239 

And chiefly thou, whose undetermined state 

Is yet the business of the gods' debate, 

Whether in after times, to be declared, 

The patron of the world, and Rome's peculiar guard, 

Or o'er the fruits and seasons to preside, 

And the round circuit of the year to guide — 

Powerful of blessings, which thou strew'st around, 

And with thy goddess mother's myrtle crowned, 

Or wilt thou, Caesar, choose the watery reign 

To smooth the surges, and correct the main? 

Then mariners, in storms, to thee shall pray ; 

E'en utmost Thule shall thy power obey ; 

And Neptune shall resign the fasces of the sea. 

The watery virgins for thy bed shall strive, 

And Tethys all her waves in dowry give. 

Or wilt thou bless our summers with thy rays, 

And, seated near the Balance, poise the days, 

"Where in the void of heaven a space is free, 

Betwixt the Scorpion and the Maid, for thee? 

The Scorpion, ready to receive thy laws, 

Yields half his region, and contracts his claws. 

Whatever part of heaven thou shalt obtain, 

(For let not hell presume of such a i-eign ; 

Nor let so dire a thirst of empire move 

Thy mind, to leave thy kindred gods above ; 

Though Greece admires Elysium's blest retreat, 

Though Proserpine affects her silent seat, 

And, importuned by Ceres to remove, 

Prefers the fields below to those above,) 

Be thou propitious, Caesar ! guide my course, 

And to my bold endeavors add thy force ; 

Pity the poet's and the plowman's cares ; 

Interest thy greatness in our mean affairs, 

And use thyself betimes to hear and grant our prayers. 

We go on a few verses : 

While yet the spring is young, while earth unbinds 
Her frozen bosom to the western winds ; 
While mountain snows dissolve against the sun, 
And streams, yet new, from precipices run ; 
E'en in this early dawning of the year, 
Produce the plow, and yoke the sturdy steer, 
And goad him till he groans beneath his toil, 
Till the bright share is buried in the soil. 

These last lines, with others to follow, Daniel Webster, in 
the spring preceding the autumn in which he died, copied 
from memory, scarcely missing a word, in a letter written 



240 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

from Washington, to his farmer in New Hampshire. No 
doubt the great statesman had carried up the passage in 
his mind, from boyhood to this his seventy-first year. The 
characteristic comments with which he introduced and fol- 
lowed his quotation are interesting: 

"John Taylor : I am glad to hear from you again, and 
to learn that you are all well, and that your teams and tools 
are ready for spring's work, whenever the weather will 
allow you to begin. I sometimes read books on farming, 
and I remember that a very old author advises farmers 'to 
plow naked, and to sow naked.' By this he means that 
there is no use in beginning spring's work till the weather 
is warm, that a farmer may throw aside his winter clothes, 
and roll up his sleeves. Yet he says we ought to begin as 
early in the year as possible. He wrote some very pretty 
verses on the subject, which, as far as I remember, run thus," — 

Webster, having given the lines, proceeds idiosyncratically : 

"John Taylor, when you read these lines do you not see the 
snow melting, and the little streams beginning to run down 
the southern slopes of your Punch Brook pasture, and the 
new grass starting and growing in the trickling water, all 
green and bright and beautiful ? And do you not see your 
Durham oxen smoking from heat and perspiration, as they 
draw along your great breaking-up plow, cutting and turn- 
ing over the tough sward in your meadow, in the great fields ? " 

We may as well let Webster proceed a little farther, with 
Virgil's Georgics according to Dryden : 

"The name [so Webster tells his farmer] of this sensible 
author is Virgil, and he gives farmers much other advice, 
some of which you have been following all this winter, with- 
out ever knowing that he had given it : 

But when cold weather, heavy snows and rain 

The laboring farmer in his house restrain, 

Let him forecast his work with timely care, 

Which else is huddled when the skies are fair ; 

Then let him mark the sheep, and whet the shining share, 



Virgil. 241 

Or hollow trees for boats, or number o'er 

His sacks, or measure his increasing store ; 

Or sharpen stakes, and mend each rack and fork; 

So to be ready, in good time to work, 

Visit his crowded barns, at early morn, 

Look to his granary and shell his corn ; 

Give a good breakfast to his numerous kine, 

His shivering poultry and his fattening swine." 

The foregoing lines are in Webster's quotation modified 
to suit them better to the state of things in New England. 
Still greater freedom he uses in the following passage, of 
which he writes : 

" And Mr. Virgil says some other things, which you un- 
derstand up at Franklin as well as ever he did : 

In chilling winter, swains enjoy their store, 
Forget their hardships, and recruit for more ; 
The farmer to full feasts invites his friends, 
And what he got with pains, with pleasure spends ; 
Draws chairs around the fire, and tells once more 
Stories which often have been told before ; 
Spreads a clean table with things good to eat, 
And adds some moistening to his fruit and meat; 
They praise his hospitality, and feel 
They shall sleep better after such a meal. 

" John Taylor, by the time you have got through this, you 
will have read enough. 

" The sum of all is, be ready for your spring's work, as 
soon as the weather is warm enough. 

" And then, put in the plow, and turn not back. 

" Daniel Webster." 

" Feasts " for " bowls," in the third line of the last cita- 
tion, is a substitution of Webster's. The last six lines are 
Webster's own, improvised in playful imitation of Virgil 
translated by Dryden. 

We make now a bold bound forward and light upon the 
end of Virgil's Georgics. The last book, our readers will 
remember, is devoted to the subject of bees. A climax is 
sought and found by the poet in a queer bit of thaumaturgy. 
He tells how bees, having once been quite lost to the 
11 



242 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



world, were renewed in their stock by a process which he 
describes at great length in one of the most elaborate 
episodes of the poem. Proteus figures in the episode 
Proteus, a humorous old sea-god who has it for his specialty 
to be a cheat of the first water. He can slip from form to 
form in the very hands of those who hold him. But bind 
him, caught asleep, and you have him at advantage. Unless 
he manages still to deceive you as to his own true identity 
and so to make his escape from your hand, you can compel 
him to tell you any thing whatever, past, present, or future, 
you may desire to know. (Those of our readers who supply 
themselves with full translations of both Virgil and Ovid may 
compare these two poets in their several treatments of the 
Proteus legend.) The upshot is that the bee-seeker is di- 
rected to slay four fine bulls and four fair heifers and have 
their carcasses exposed. The wonderful sequel is thus told 
by the poet, (Professor Conington's prose translation once 
more :) 

After when the ninth morn-goddess had ushered in the dawn, he sends 
to Orpheus a funeral sacrifice, and visits the grove again. And now a 
portent sudden and marvelous to tell, meets their view : through the 
whole length of the kine's dissolving flesh bees are seen, buzzing in the 
belly and boiling out through the bursten ribs, and huge clouds lengthen 
and sway, till at last they pour altogether to the tree's top, and let down 
a cluster from the bending boughs. 
The conclusion of the poem follows immediately : 

Such was the song I was making ; a song of the husbandry of fields 
and cattle, and of trees ; while Caesar, the great, is flashing wars thun- 
derbolt over the depths of Euphrates, and dispensing among willing 
nations a conqueror's law, and setting his foot on the road to the sky. 
In those days I was being nursed in Parthenope's delicious lap, em- 
bowered in the pursuits of inglorious peace-I, Virgil, who once dallied 
with the shepherd's muse, and with a young mans boldness, sang 
thee, Tityrus, under the spreading beechen shade. 
The poetry of the Georgics is of a texture more finished 
than is that of the poetry of the ^neid. You have, however, 



Virgil. 243 

to pick your steps in this poem with some care, if you are 
reading it aloud to a mixed company. Still, the standard and 
purpose of Virgil are, according to the age and the nation 
for which he wrote, good and pure, even nobly good and 
pure. It will be interesting and suggestive to compare an 
English poet's Georgics with the great Roman's. Read 
Thomson's Seasons as in some respects a parallel for Virgil's 
Georgics. 

We come to the iEneid. This great epic has attracted 
many translators. We here shall have no doubt, no hesita- 
tion, in choosing from among the number. Mr. Conington, 
the late Professor John Conington, of Oxford, England, is 
unquestionably our man. Other translators than he have 
their merits ; but for exhaustive learned preparation, schol- 
arlike accuracy, divining insight, conscientious fidelity, sure 
good sense, resourceful command of language, unflagging 
spirit, Mr. Conington is easily the best of all Virgil's English 
metrical translators. 

A serious abatement has to be made. Mr. Conington has 
chosen for his verse a measure, not only such that the proper 
stately Virgilian movement is lost in the English form which 
the poem assumes, but such that this movement suffers 
change to a gait entirely different, indeed violently con- 
trasted. Virgil's line is like the Juno he describes in one of 
his own memorably fine, almost untranslatable, expressions ; 
it moves with measured tread as queen. Mr. Conington's 
translation gives us a line that always hastens, and that 
sometimes runs with breathless speed. The high, queenly, 
sweeping, dactylic gait that Virgil taught his verse is trans- 
formed by Mr. Conington into a quick, springing, eager, for- 
ward, iambic bound. Perhaps, too, in a poem so long, the 
versification is felt at last to be a little monotonous. Mr. 
Conington adopts the octosyllabic wayward irregular meter, 
made so popular in the handling of Sir Walter Scott. You 
read the ^Eneid as if you were reading another Lady of the 



244 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Lake. The flowing 
robes of the dactylic 
hexameter are cinct- 
ured and retrenched 
into the neat, trim, 
smart frock of a Scot- 
tish lassie. 

But our readers are 
nottobe discomposed. 
The total effect is re- 
markably good. We 
have told you the 
whole truth. You get 
Virgil in almost every 
thing, but the move- 
ment of his verse. It 
needs to be added 
that Mr. Conington, 
brilliant as he is, brill- 
iantly poetical almost, 
still remains rather a 
versifier than essen- 
tially a poet. He 
gives you not poetry 
so much as rhetoric 
in rhyme. But it is 
good rhyme, and it is 
good rhetoric. Now 
Virgil is a true poet ; 
but his poetry is, far 
more than is Homer's, 
rhetorical. Coning- 
ton, thus for his task 

with Virgil, did not quite so absolutely need, as did Worsley 

for his task with Homer, to be a true poet. 




Virgil. 245 

There was, by the way, a relation between Worsley, the 
translator of Homer, and Conington, the translator of Virgil, 
of which our readers will like to hear. The two were mutual 
friends. They knew how to appreciate each other, and how 
to encourage each other by reciprocal appreciation. Mr. 
Worsley began to translate the Iliad, as he had before trans- 
lated the Odyssey, in the Spenserian stanza of his choice. 
Now, Mr. Conington did not wholly approve of his friend's 
stanza, for the purpose; but when, about midway in the 
Iliad, the pen dropped from Worsley's failing hand, and his 
noble translation of the Homeric poems seemed likely to re- 
main a torso, Mr. Conington, in his friend's behoof, took 
up the unfinished task, and brought it to a prosperous com- 
pletion. The external character of the workmanship is in- 
distinguishably the same as you pass the joint made in 
crossing from Worsley to Conington. Only the reader who 
possesses, or who imagines himself to possess, a subtle sense 
of poetry as differenced from verse and rhetoric, will perceive 
any change of literary standard in the work. 

We give Virgil's iEneid chiefly in Conington's version. 
But there are other renderings of which our readers will en- 
joy seeing specimens. Foremost, of somewhat ancient fame, 
stands John Dryden's. You already know, from what you 
have seen of his handling of the Georgics, the character 
which Dryden's ^Eneid will inevitably bear. There will be 
vigor, there will be wit — if any chance offers, sometimes per- 
haps without much offering chance — there will be occasional 
breaches of taste, there will be plentiful noble negligence of 
fidelity to the original, and there will be sonorous rhythm 
and rhyme. We shall not need to furnish, in great quantity, 
additional samples of Dryden — who, by the way, says 
"^Eneis" instead of "^Eneid." In fact our spelling reform- 
ers are an age, nay, several ages, too late. They ought to 
have come with Dryden, or before. There was, in the his- 
tory of our tongue, a time when the forms of words were very 



246 Preparatory Lati?i Course in English. 

conveniently unfixed and plastic. yEneid, ^neis, Eneidos, 
Eneados, are some of the various spellings for the title to 
Virgil's great epic, with which the curious explorer of books 
pertaining to their author will meet. 

Mr. William Morris, too, of our own time, has his fancy for 
naming the epic of Virgil. His translation he entitles, " The 
^Eneids of Virgil Done into English Verse." Each book, 
that is, of the poem, he will have to be an ^Eneid, as a 
Georgic, one might call each book of the Georgics. Mr. 
Morris, a Victorian poet, adopts for his verse the fourteen- 
syllabled couplet, in which George Chapman, of the age of 
Elizabeth, translated the Iliad. Mr. Morris was anticipated 
in his choice of this meter for the work. More than three 
hundred years ago, Thomas Phaer, a physician, translated 
the first nine books of the iEneid in the same form of English 
verse. Phaer (or Phaier, or Phaire, or Phayer, or Phayre — 
even English proper names were then such good subjects 
for spelling reform) was thirty years or so before George 
Chapman. 

Some of our readers may prefer Mr. Morris's style to Mr. 
Conington's. You shall see enough of Mr. Morris's render- 
ing to enable you to choose for yourselves independently of 
your author's choice. Our own countryman, Mr. C. P. 
Cranch — like Mr. Morris, poet and artist both in one — has 
translated the Iliad into blank verse. We shall show you 
a sample also of his work. And Mr. John D. Long, late 
governor of Massachusetts, now one of that commonwealth's 
representatives in Congress, a man of singularly clear fame, 
still young enough to let the hope of unaccomplished years 
be large and lucid round his brow — Mr. Long, we say, has 
executed in blank verse a translation of the ^Eneid, some 
specimen lines of which we shall take pleasure in presenting 
to our readers. As already remarked, however, we shall 
unhesitatingly choose Conington to furnish us the main 
current of our citation from Virgil. 



Virgih 



247 



The setting forth of the subject of the poem is excellent 
literary art, in Virgil's text. We cannot do better than to 
exhibit to our readers a collation of the forms in which this 



/ 



appears, as rendered by different translators, 
ington lead : 

Arms and the man I sing, who first, 
By Fate of Tlian realm amerced, 
To fair Italia onward bore, 
And landed on Lavinium's shore : — 
Long tossing earth and ocean o'er, 
By violence of heaven, to sate 
Fell Juno's unforgetting hate : 
Much labored too in battle-field, 
Striving his city's walls to build, 

And give his gods a home : 
Thence come the hardy Latin brood, 
The ancient sires of Alba's blood, 

And lofty-ramp ired Rome. 



Let Mr. Con- 



Dryden 



Arms, and the man I sing, who, forced by Fate, 
And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate, 
Expelled and exiled, left the Trojan shore. 
Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore, 
And in the doubtful war, before he won 
The Latian realm, and built the destined town ; 
His banished gods restored to rites divine, 
And settled sure succession in his line, 
From whence the race of Alban fathers come 
And the long glories of majestic Rome. 



Morris : 






I sing of arms, I sing of him, who from the Trojan land 
Thrust forth by Fate, to Italy and that Lavinian strand 
First came : all tost about was he on earth and on the deep 
By heavenly might for Juno's wrath, that had no mind to sleep: 
And plenteous war he underwent ere he his town might frame 
And set his gods in Latian earth, whence is the Latin name, 
And father-folk of Alba-town, and walls of mighty Rome. 



Cranch : 

I sing of arms, and of the man who first 
Y~ Came from the coasts of Troy to Italy 

And the Lavinian shores, exiled by fate. 
Much was he tossed about upon the lands 
And in the ocean by supernal powers, 
Because of cruel Juno's sleepless wrath. 



248 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



Many things also suffered he in war 
Until he built a city, and his gods 
Brought into Latium ; whence the Latin race, 
The Alban sires, and walls of lofty Rome. 



Long: 



I sing of war. I sing the man who erst, 

From off the shore of Troy fate-hunted, came 

To the Lavinian coast in Italy, 

Hard pressed on land and sea, the gods malign, 

Fierce Juno's hate unslaked. Much too in war 

He bore while he a city built, and set 

His gods in Latium. Thence the Latin race, 

Our Alban sires, the walls of haughty Rome ! 

It is no part of our purpose to discuss at any length the 
particular merits of the various versions that we name. Here, 
in at least one short sample, they all are ; choose, dear read- 
ers, for yourselves. Something, however, we may perhaps 
wisely say about the varying degrees of fidelity to the original 
observable in these versions. 

In preparation for such a comparison, while it may mystify, 
it may also entertain, possibly stimulate, the reader familiar 
only with English, if, of this one short passage we present a 
word-for-word translation, with the verbal order preserved of 
the original Latin. Latin prose has an order of construction 
which one might follow pretty closely, translating into En- 
glish, and produce results that would be intelligible, (some- 
times, indeed, barely so,) though marked with violent unidio- 
matic inversions, dislocations, and involutions. But Latin 
poetry has apparently well-nigh unlimited license in the 
relative order of its words. From such a translation as we 
are now about to give, of the opening lines of the yEneid, the 
English reader might almost seem justified in judging the 
verbal order of the passage in the original Latin to be as 
lawless, as if it had been reached by simply shuffling the proper 
words together in an arrangement purely fortuitous. Such, 
however, is by no means the case. Even in poetical con- 
struction, the law of Latin syntax still prevails, though pre- 
vailing after a manner which it would be uninteresting to 



Virgil. 249 

explain to one not versed at all in the language. What per- 
mits such seemingly strange collocation of words in a Latin 
sentence is principally the inflection to which Latin nouns 
and adjectives are subject. In most instances, you know ab- 
solutely whether a given noun is subject or object, in a Latin 
sentence, by the form in which it stands. What noun a giv- 
en adjective affects, you know by the agreement in gender, 
number, and case, that subsists between the two. This pe- 
culiarity of the Latin language, (it belongs to the Greek no 
less,) as compared with the English, renders it possible for a 
Latin writer, without injury to clearness of style, to use, in 
disjoining and separating related words, a degree of freedom 
that in English would be hopelessly confusing — which let our 
readers see for themselves in the following literal, over-literal, 
translation of the lines from Virgil that they have now. just 
read in a number of metrical versions : 

Arms, man-and I sing, of Troy who first from shores | To Italy by 
fate to Lavinian-and came | Coasts much he both on lands tossed about, 
and on deep | By violence of superior beings, fierce mindful Juno's on 
account of wrath | Many things besides also in war suffering while he 
should build city | Bring-and gods to Latium: race whence Latin Alban- 
and fathers, and of lofty walls Rome. 

Such an assemblage of words as the foregoing would cer- 
tainly answer very well for a puzzle to amuse the leisurely 
and curious mind of childhood — the problem being to arrange 
the jumbled words in the order necessary to give sense, and 
the true sense. Take, for example, the clause, " fierce mindful 
Juno's on account of wrath." The words of this clause 
would present a quite hopeless riddle. You could not tell 
with which noun to join the different adjectives. The order 
might be, " on account of fierce mindful Juno's wrath." The 
idea in fact is, " on account of fierce Juno's mindful wrath," 
and there is in the Latin no chance of other rendering. If 
readers would feel it a relief to have their brains settled, 
after whirling in the vortices, or wandering in the mazes, of 
11* 



250 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

our too-literal translation, let them now peruse Professor 
Conington's clear and beautiful prose rendering of the same 
passage : 

Arms and the man I sing, who at the first from Troy's shores the 
exile of destiny, won his way to Italy and her Latian coast — a man 
much buffeted on land and on the deep by violence from above, to sate 
the unforgetting wrath of Juno the cruel — much scourged too in war, as 
he struggled to build him a city, and find his gods a home in Latium — 
himself the father of the Latian people, and the chiefs of Alba's houses, 
and the walls of high towering Rome. 

Professor Conington translates, you see, even in prose, 
with noble liberality. The Latin has no article. Whether 
the conception of the original writer may be better expressed 
by "the," or by "a," or by neither, is always a point to be 
decided for each particular case on its own grounds. In our 
own servile translation, we preferred to give the nouns uni- 
formly quite bare of articles. 

Professor Conington, we may in passing mention, besides 
his translation in verse of the ^Eneid, and in prose of the 
books of Virgil entire, has also a scholarly edition with notes 
of the original Latin text of his author. (And, by the way, 
since our " Preparatory Greek Course in English," there has 
appeared a choice prose translation of the Odyssey by 
Messrs. Butcher & Lang, obtainable at a fair price, in two 
different editions, that of Macmillan & Co., and that of D. 
Lothrop & Co. Both are well printed, but the latter is in 
larger type. A prose version of the Iliad, executed on the 
same plan, has also lately appeared.) Mr. W. T. Sellar has 
a thorough and satisfactory book on Virgil under the general 
title, "Roman Poets of the Augustan Age." To Professor 
Frieze, of the University of Michigan, must be attributed the 
merit of giving the lead to American scholars in producing 
school editions of the y£neid, luminous not only with learn- 
ing, but with choice graphic illustrations of the text. We 
here are indebted to the liberality of Professor Frieze's 



Virgil. 251 

publishers, Messrs. D. Appleton & Co., for many of the cuts 
distributed through our own pages. 

The yEneid is of set deliberate purpose a national epic in 
the strictest sense. Such, the Iliad, Hellenic as that poem is 
throughout, is not. It happens that the Iliad is Greek. Vir- 
gil expressly designed to produce a poem that should be 
Roman and national. The .^Eneid is accordingly, in its 
plan, a larger poem than the Iliad. The wrath of Achilles 
suffices to Homer for theme. Virgil's theme must be noth- 
ing less than the founding of Rome. The Iliad, personal by 
intention, is only by accident national. The ^Eneid, na- 
tional by intention, is only by accident personal. Virgil is 
second and secondary to Homer. But nobody can deny 
that the conception of Virgil's poem, as a whole, though it 
may lack the attribute of spontaneity, may be cold-blood- 
edly intentional and conventional, is at least nobler in breadth 
and magnitude, perhaps also in height and aspiration, than 
is the conception of the Iliad. The Iliad grew to be what it 
was. The yEneid was made such as we have it by a first 
great act of invention on the part of the poet. Virgil's poem 
w r as, from the first, what, with few intervals, it has always re- 
mained, a school-book. Its national character eminently 
fitted it to be, as it was, a school-book to Roman boys. 

A short summary of the action of the ^Eneid may help the 
reader follow intelligently the sequence of events. Virgil 
really does, what Homer is often said to do, but does not, 
plunge into the midst of things with his story. 

In the first book, ^Eneas, the seventh summer after the fall 
of Troy, lands with his companions on the Carthaginian coast. 
Here, Ulysses-like, he relates to Carthaginian Queen Dido 
the story of his previous adventures and wanderings. This 
narration occupies two more books of the poem. The fourth 
book contains the episode of the mutual passion between 
Dido and ^Eneas, ending tragically for Dido in his faithless 
desertion of her and in her death by cruel suicide. The fifth 



252 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

book describes the games celebrated by the Trojans on the 
hospitable shores of Sicily in honor of ./Eneas's dead father, 
Anchises (An-ki'ses.) In the sixth book, JEneas, arrived in 
Italy, makes his descent into the lower world. The rest of 
the poem relates the fortunes of ^Eneas in obtaining a set- 
tlement for the Trojans in Italy. There is war. Against 
the invaders, a great Italian champion appears, who serves 
the same purpose of foil to yEneas as long before did Hector 
to Achilles. The end, of course, is victory for ^Eneas. 

We now return to let Virgil himself, speaking by the voice 
of English interpreter Conington, take us forward the first 
stage of his poem. There is, in the whole ^Eneid, no more 
finished versification, no more skillful narrative, no greater 
wealth of quotable and quoted phrases, than you will find in 
the first book of the poem. We should much like to give 
the book entire. We, however, promise ourselves the pros- 
pect of affording our readers even more pleasure by showing 
them the full text, or as nearly as possible the full text, of 
the sixth book. This, indeed, we feel under some obliga- 
tion to do. In the volume preceding this, we omitted the 
Homeric story of a visit on the part of Ulysses to Hades — 
making peace with our readers then by a hint that we should 
by and by have the Virgilian version of the same incident to 
offer in compensation. We, therefore, condense Virgil's first 
book — by retrenchments which, not less on account of the 
beauty of the translation, than on account of the beauty of 
the original, it irks us sore to make. We begin with a cita- 
tion long enough to include a fine example of Virgil's sub- 
limity, appearing in the description of a storm and shipwreck. 
But first let us do as boys do when they are about to make a 
fine jump — let us go back a little and get a start before be- 
ginning. The few lines of transition intervening between 
the introduction and the story proper of Virgil are too good 
and too famous to be wholly left out. These, in particular 
— an invocation : 



Virgil. 



2 53 



Say, muse, for godhead how disdained, 

Or wherefore wroth, Heaven's queen constrained 

That soul of piety so long 

To turn the wheel, to cope with wrong. 

Can heavenly natures flourish hate 

So fierce, so blindly passionate ? 

The last couplet is the rendering, unfortunately somewhat 
dilute by amplification, of celebrated words : 
Tantsene animis ccelestibus irae ? 

Literally: Angers so great in minds celestial? 

What immediately follows this challenge to the muse con- 
tains the supposably muse-inspired account of the matter in- 
quired about. Juno was jealous — partly on behalf of threat- 
ened Carthage, beloved by her, and partly on account of 
a slight done to her own claims of personal beauty, by 
Trojan Paris's judgment that Venus was lovelier than she. 
The passage contains memorable phrases, for example : Samo 
posthabita, meaning " [even] Samos being held in less esteem 
[than Carthage] " — an expression not unfrequently quoted, 
in various adaptation, by modern writers; alta mente repos- 
tum, literally, " stored up in her [Juno's] deep mind," said of 
the invidious judgment of Paris ; relliquias Danaum atque 
immitis Achilli, literally, " remnants left by the Danaans and 
by pitiless Achilles," applying to the escaped Trojans ; now 
a whole Virgilian line, 

Tantse molis erat Romanam condere gentem, 

which let Conington modulate for us from the lofty single 
Virgilian hexameter to the ringing octosyllabic couplet : 

So vast the labor to create, 
The fabric of the Roman state. 

Two lines for one, with however but two syllables added to 
the number of syllables. 

We need not tell our readers that the machinery with 
which, in the comparatively long citation to follow, the raising 
and calming of the tempest are brought about, was already 



254 Preparatory Lati?i Course in English. 

in Virgil's time nearly as much an exploded superstition at 
Rome as is the case in our own day. There is in the intro- 
duction, on Virgil's part, of this absurd supernaturalism a 
certain lack of genuineness apparent, which in Homer we 
nowhere discover. The tempest-raising part of ^Eolus in this 
action is a transfer from Homer. ^Eolus has just responded 
favorably to an appeal from Juno for his intervention. His 
intervention is prompt. It was, literally, a word and a blow: 

He said, and with his spear struck wide 

The portals in the mountain side : 

At once, like soldiers in a band, 

Forth rush the winds, and scour the land: 

Then lighting heavily on the main, 

East, South, and West with storms in train, 

Heave from its depth the watery floor, 

And roll great billows to the shore. 

Then come the clamor and the shriek, 

The sailors shout, the main-ropes creak : 

All in a moment sun and skies 

Ai'e blotted from the Trojan's eyes: 

Black night is brooding o'er the deep, 

Sharp thunder peals, live lightnings leap : 

The stoutest warrior holds his breath, 

And looks as on the face of death. 

At once /Eneas thrilled with dread ; 

Forth from his breast, with hands outspread, 

These groaning words he drew : 
" O happy, thrice and yet again, 
Who died at Troy like valiant men, 

E'en in their parents' view ! 
O Diomed, first of Greeks in fray, 
Why pressed I not the plain that day, 

Yielding my life to you, 
Where stretched beneath a Phrygian sky 
Fierce Hector, tall Sarpedon lie : 
Where Simois tumbles 'neath his wave 
Shields, helms, and bodies of the brave ? " 

Now, howling from the north, the gale, 
While thus he moans him, strikes his sail : 
The swelling surges climb the sky ; 
The shattered oars in splinters fly ; 
The prow turns round, and to the tide 
Lays broad and bare the vessel's side ; 
On comes a billow mountain-steep, 
Bears down, and tumbles in a heap. 



Virgil. 



2 55 



These stagger on the billow's crest, 
Those to the yawning depth deprest 
See land appearing 'mid the waves, 
While surf with sand in turmoil raves. 
Three ships the South has caught and thrown 



On 



hid rocks, as altars known, 



Ridging the main, a reef of stone. 

Three more fierce Eurus from the deep, 

A sight to make the gazer weep, 

Drives on the shoals, and banks them round 

With sand, as with a rampire-mound. 

One, which erewhile from Lycia's shore 

Orontes and his people bore, 

E'en in iEneas's anguished sight 

A sea down crashing from the height 

Strikes full astern : the pilot, torn 

From off the helm, is headlong borne : 

Three turns the foundered vessel gave, 

Then sank beneath the engulfing wave. 

There in the vast abyss are seen 

The swimmers, few and far between, 

And warrior's arms and shattered wood, 

And Trojan treasures strew the flood. 

And now Ilioneus, and now 

Aletes old and gray, 
Abas and brave Achates bow, 

Beneath the tempest's sway ; 
Fast drinking in through timbers loose 
At every pore the fatal ooze, 

Their sturdy barks give way. 

Neptune at this point 

His calm broad brow o'er ocean rears. 




NEPTUNE CALMING THE SEA. 



256 Preparatory Latin Course in Ejiglish. 

He speaks with highly pacific effect thus described : 

As when sedition oft lias stirred 

In some great town the vulgar herd, 

And brands and stones already fly — 

For Rage lias weapons always nigh — 

Then should some man of worth appear 

Whose stainless virtue all revere, 

They hush, they list : his clear voice rules 

Their rebel wills, their anger cools : 

So ocean ceased at once to rave, 

When, calmly looking o'er the wave, 

Girt with a range of azure sky, 

The father bids his chariot fly. 

The foregoing simile is a celebrated one. The allusion in 
it is, with great probability, held to be to an incident in 
Cicero's oratorical career. Roscius Otho had been greeted 
in a theater with a tumultuary storm of hisses. The disturb- 
ance grew to a riot. Cicero was summoned. He got the 
people into a temple near by, and there, with infinite skill, 
rebuked and rallied them out of their ill-temper. It was a 
striking triumph of oratory seconded by character. 

The couplet italicized a little way back, translates 

Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto, 

a highly picturesque phrase of description, which you will 
occasionally meet as classical garnish, to a passage of writing 
in English. 

Our readers, we are sure, must feel with us that such 
verse as they have now been reading is full of spirit. They 
may equally feel that it represents, and well represents, an 
original worthy of being thus admirably translated. 

The " tempest-tossed ^Bneadae " (Trojans) struggle ashore, 
and there make themselves as comfortable as they can. 
yEneas gets a shot (with bow and arrow) at some deer that 
come within sight and range. He kills just a deer apiece 
for his seven ships, and, with this good fortune to support 
him, he harangues his comrades: 



Virgil. 



257 



Comrades and friends ! for ours is strength 

Has brooked the test of woes ; 
O worse-scarred hearts ! these wounds at length 

The gods will heal, like those. 
You that have seen grim Scylla rave, 

And heard her monsters yell, 
You that have looked upon the cave 

Where savage Cyclops dwell, 
Come, cheer your souls, your fears forget ; 
This suffering will yield us yet 

A pleasant tale to tell. 
Through chance, through peril lies our way 
To Latium, where the fates display 
A mansion of abiding stay: 
There Troy her fallen realm shall raise : 
Bear up, and live for happier days. 



The couplet italicized translates 

Et hgec olim meminisse juvabit, 

(literally: Even these things hereafter to remember will 
afford delight,) a sentiment often quoted by modern authors 
in Virgil's own happy expression. 

Venus intervenes. She begs her father Jove to let her do 
something handsome for her beloved Trojans. She took 
Jove at the right moment and went at him in the right way. 
He is completely overcome. He most paternally reassures 
his irresistible daughter with a pro- 
phetic sketch of the future awaiting 
her chosen nation. What noble flat- 
tery Virgil manages thus to offer to 
his countrymen, and to his illustri- 
ous patron, the emperor — we must 
leave it to the imagination of our 
readers to conjecture. An era of 
tranquillity, of course the Augustan 
age, is foreshadowed, in which 




JANUS. 



Grim iron bolt and massive bar 
Shall close the dreadful gates of war. 



258 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

In the closing line of the prophetic passage, by us omitted, 
Rage, personified, is represented as in the prosperous peace 
foretold roaring vainly 

From lips incarnadined with gore. 

Here "incarnadined" (dyed red) is a word that Coning- 
ton, and with fine felicity, takes, no doubt, at the suggestion 
of Shakespeare's 

The multitudinous seas incarnadine. 

The word has a certain Virgilian quality which warrants 
Mr. Conington in using it, as he does, more than once in the 
course of his translation. 

The next day ^Eneas had an adventure that was worth 
while. He met his goddess-mother, Venus, not confessed in 
her true divine identity, but wearing a disguise of virgin 
loveliness, which Virgil beautifully describes as follows : 

In mien and gear a Spartan maid, 
Or like Ilarpalyce arrayed, 
Who tires fleet coursers in the chase, 
And heads the swiftest streams of Thrace. 
Slung from her shoulders hangs a bow ; 
Loose to the wind her tresses flow ; 
Bare was her knee ; her mantle's fold 
The gathering of a knot controlled. 

The colloquy which ensued we have no room to give at 
large. The goddess informs ./Eneas where he is, and how, 
under present circumstances, he ought to manage matters. 
The bewitching creature uses one simile, to convey her en- 
couragement to her son, that is divine enough to be reported 
to our readers : 

Mark those twelve swans, that hold their way 

In seemly jubilant array, 

Whom late, down swooping from on high, 

Jove's eagle scattered through the sky ; 

Now see them o'er the land extend 

Or hover, ready to descend : 

They, rallying, sport on noisy wing, 

And circle round the heaven, and sing : 



Virgil 259 



ram. 



E'en so your ships, your martial tr; 
Have gained the port, or stand to gain. 
Then pause not further, but proceed 
Still following where the road shall lead. 

The immediate sequel was tantalizing in the extreme. 

Venus revealed herself as Venus and— instantly vanished : 

She turned, and flashed upon their view 
Her stately neck's purpureal hue ; 
Ambrosial tresses round her head 
A more than earthly fragrance shed : 
Her falling robe her footprints swept, 
And showed the goddess as she slept. 

She through the sky to Paphos moves, 
And seeks the temple of her loves. 

The line in Italics translates 

Et vera incessu patuit dea, 

an expression familiar in quotation. 

The two Trojans, JEneas and his faithful companion, Acha- 
tes, shrouded by Venus in a cloud, invisibly visit the scene 
of the labors in progress for the founding of Carthage. The 
description is very fine in Virgil, and it loses nothing of spirit 
in the finished version of Mr. Conington. A simile occurs 
in it, one of Virgil's best, which our readers must not lose. 
The various busy labor of the Carthaginian builders is the 
subject: . 

So bees, when spring-time is begun 
Ply their warm labor in the sun, 
What time along the flowery mead 
Their nation's infant hope they lead ; 
Or with clear honey charge each cell, 
And make the hive with sweetness swell, 
The workers of their loads relieve, 
Or chase the drones, that gorge and thieve : 
With toil the busy scene ferments, 
And fragrance breathes from thymy scents. 

The italicized line translates two words in the original, 
Fervet opus, " glows the work," literally rendered— a phrase 
of great descriptive power, which Mr. Conington injures by 
his compulsory dilution of it. 



260 Preparatory Lati7i Course in English. 

^Eneas — Achates is now neglected by the poet — looks about 
him at his leisure. He examines a temple to Juno, and in it 
sees what affects him to tears — tears such as Ulysses also wept 
in the Phaeacian land. The Trojan war is depicted in the 
decorations. One of his exclamations at the sight — an ex- 
clamation we are to suppose to have been inaudible, as the 
utterer of it was invisible — is famous in frequent citation. 
There is a charm-like effect to the words, which makes them 
seem somehow to convey a meaning deeper than they really 
do: 

E'en here the tear of pity springs, 

And hearts are touched by human things, 

an inadequate rendering of language which perhaps no art 
could successfully transmute into another and equivalent 
form of expression. These are Virgil's magical words : 

Sunt lacrymoe rerum et mentem mortalia tangunt. 

A previous word, "here," meaning 'even at Carthage,' af- 
fects the line and makes it say, literally, " Here too there are 
tears for things [that need them] and mortal experiences 
touch the mind." 

The whole passage, descriptive of the scenes that were 
portrayed in that temple, is exceedingly fine. ^Eneas made 
a rapt study of what he saw, until he was interrupted by 
the approach of Queen Dido, whom the poet ushers in to us 
with a stately simile. 

Dido seats herself and gives out laws — when, behold, 
some of those Trojans who were shipwrecked make their ap- 
pearance. Invisible ^Eneas and Achates are overjoyed, but 
they wait and listen while one of their Trojan friends de- 
livers himself of an extremely well-conceived appeal, for fa- 
vorable consideration, to the queen and her subjects. The 
speaker makes flowing promises of the most honorable con- 
duct on the part of his companions, and on that of the Tro- 
jans in general, by way of return for the hospitality they crave. 



Virgil. 261 

The Carthaginian queen responds with the utmost grace of 
majesty. She says she will send to seek their great ^Eneas. 
^Eneas himself, with his friend Achates, amid the clouds 
can scarcely keep from crying out. The cloud seems to feel 
by sympathy the effects of his impulse to speak. It parts 

And purges brightening into day. 

And now an Homeric miracle. The goddess-mother of 
^Eneas does for her son what readers of the Odyssey will re- 
member Pallas Athene more than once did for her favorite 
warrior and sage, Ulysses — she glorifies ^Eneas into godlike 
grace and beauty. The transfiguration is beautifully por- 
trayed by Virgil, and Mr. Conington as translator is not 
wanting to the occasion : 

^Eneas stood, to sight confest, 

A very god in face and chest : 

For Venus round her darling's head 

A, length of clustering locks had spread, 

Crowned him with youth's purpureal light, 

And made his eyes gleam glad and bright : 

Such loveliness the hands of art 

To ivory's native hues impart : 

So 'mid the gold around it placed 

Shines silver pale or marble chaste. 

Radiant ^Eneas makes to Dido a very gallant speech, full of 
chivalrous engagement. You would have taken him for the 
soul of honor. But honor, as we Christians understand the 
idea, was by no means ^Eneas's forte. ^Eneas's specialty was 
" piety " — piety in the sense of reverence for the gods and 
for parents, and of regard for duties owed to country. Vir- 
gil's attribution of piety to ^Eneas did not in the least imply 
that he, pious soul, might not all the same be a very poor 
reliance in relations other than the ones above specified. 
This, Dido, to her undoing, was presently to learn. Uncon- 
sciously, or indeed perhaps consciously, Virgil incorporated 
the very spirit of the ideal Roman character in his hero 



262 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

./Eneas. To this " pious " man nothing could be wrong that 
would tend to further his fortunes. But we anticipate. 

Dido, in all good sincerity, makes fit queenly return of 
^Eneas's high-flown assurances : 

Myself not ignorant of woe 
Compassion I have learned to show, 

is one of her pathetic expressions. These words translate 

the line, 

Non ignara mali miseris succerrere disco, 

which is one of the most frequently quoted of all Virgil's 
numerous contributions to the stock of current poetical com- 
monplace. Dido thus refers to a sad experience of her own, 
in the loss of her husband Sy-choe'us by foul unnatural murder. 
Poor soul, she was destined soon to be still more learned in 
the lore of woe, and that through the perfidy of this her pious 
guest. For the present, however, Dido lavishes refreshment 
on the Trojan crews, and sets her palace in order for the en- 
tertainment of their goddess-born and godlike leader, ^Eneas. 
He meantime, " loth to lose the father in the king," sends to 
have brought to him his son, the lovely lad variously named 
I-u'lus, I-lus, As-ca'ni-us. 

This quest of the father's gives Venus a chance, not to be 
lost. She plans a deceit. Her boy Cupid shall go person- 
ate Ascanius and, nestling, at the feast to be, in the bosom 
of Dido, shall infix ineradicably there a sweet sting of love 
for ^neas. The true Ascanius, her grandson, the goddess 
transports elsewhere and 

soft amaracus receives 
And gently curtains him with leaves. 

The plot prospers. Cupid enters sympathetically into the 
humor of his part. As Mr. Conington featly and daintily 
translates, 

Young Love obeyed, his plumage stripped, 

And, laughing, like lulus tripped. 



Virgil. 



263 



Unconscious Dido at the feast caresses her doom. The 

roguish Cupid having first 

satisfied the fond desire 
Of that his counterfeited sire, 
Turns him to Dido. Heart and eye 
She clings, she cleaves, she makes him lie 
Lapped in her breast, nor knows, lost fair, 
How dire a god sits heavy there. 
But he, too studious to fulfill 
His Acidalian mother's will, 
Begins to cancel trace by trace 
The imprint of Sychseus' face, 
And bids a living passion steal 
On senses long unused to feel. 

Dido is lost. She commits herself in boundless pledge to the 
Trojans. In a pause made, she solemnly appeals to Olympus, 




JUPITER AND THE OLYMPIAN GODS. 



264 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Jove as the monarch, Juno as patroness of Carthage, and Bac- 
chus as lord of feasts are the divinities invoked. Dido cries : 

O make this day a day of joy 
Alike to Tyre and wandering Troy, 
And may our children's children feel 
The blessing of the bond we seal ! 

Readers must understand that Dido was a colonist at Car- 
thage, lately come from Tyre. With her invocation of the 
Olympians, a full pledge in golden wine was poured out. 
Then the part performed by Demodocus at Homer's Phasa- 
cian banquet to Ulysses is repeated at this Didonian feast 
given in honor of ./Eneas. I-o'pas is the name of Virgil's 
bard. This name has never become so famous in subse- 
quent song and story as has the name Demodocus. Never- 
theless, the performance did not lack matter, as will show 
the following brilliant programme, itself poetry and song of 
potent spell to the imagination. How charmingly Mr. 
Conington has rendered it ! Virgil had a marked tendency 
toward philosophical poetry. Lucretius drew him strongly. 
Observe how he here makes Iopas go, as it were philosoph- 
ically, not less than poetically, into the secret of things: 

He sings the wanderings of the moon, 
The sun eclipsed in deadly swoon, 
Whence human kind and cattle came, 
And whence the rain-spout and the flame, 
Arcturus and the two bright Bears, 
And Hyads weeping showery tears, 
Why winter suns so swiftly go, 
And why the weary nights move slow. 

Discourse succeeds to feast and song. Dido asks ^Eneas 
to tell the company all about his own various fortune — with 
which request ends book first of the /Eneid. 

The second book, with the third, is made up of /Eneas's 

autobiographical story. The beginning of the tale has some 

phrases that have passed into the commonplace of quotation 

and allusion. 

Too cruel, lady, is the pain 
You bid me thus revive again, 



Virgil. 265 



is Mr. Conington's turning into English of 

Infandum, regina, jubes renovare dolorem. 

Again the couplet, 

The woes I saw with these sad eyne, 
The deeds whereof large part was mine, 



renders 



quaeque ipse miserrima vidi 
Et quorum pars magna fui. 



The last clause in particular is almost a proverb for uni- 
versal familiarity. Literally rendered, the whole quotation 
would read, " Both the things, most full of wretchedness, which 
I myself saw, and the things of which I a large part was." 
Nothing could possibly reproduce the neat denseness of the 
original Latin. Would readers like to see how Mr. Morris 
manages this place i;i his fourteen-syllabled line ? Well, he, 
through the whole poem, makes his translation keep step 
verse by verse with the original — a thing which is in itself a 
merit. But the consequence is that here we have to give 
two partial lines answering to two such in Virgil : 

which thing myself unhappy did behold, 
Yea, and was no small part thereof. 

The adjective " unhappy " he seems to make qualify " my- 
self," which in the original it does not do, it there qualifying 
the " thing," instead. 

All that I saw and part of which I was, 

is what the easy going literary conscience of Dryden per- 
mits him to make of the same passage — he, to boot, rhyming 
execrably the word " place " with the word "was." 

./Eneas, as after-dinner story-teller, sets out with the inci- 
dent of the celebrated Wooden Horse. Of this incident, 
only alluded to in our treatment of Homer, we proceed to 
12 



266 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

give Virgil's account in full, or nearly enough in full for the 
full satisfaction of our readers : 

The Danaan chiefs, with cunning given 
By Pallas, mountain-high to heaven 

A giant horse uprear, 
And with compacted beams of pine 
The texture of its ribs entwine : 
A vow for their return they feign, 
So runs the tale, and spreads amain. 
There in the monster's cavernous side 
Huge frames of chosen chiefs they hide, 
And steel-clad soldiery finds room 
Within that death-producing womb. 

This huge image of a horse the Greeks leave on shore, and 
withdraw in their ships from the Trojans' sight. The de- 
lighted Trojans swarm out of the gates to survey the de- 
serted camp of the Greeks. One of them proposes that they 
draw the colossal horse within the walls of the city. As to 
the expediency of this there are conflicting views, and 
La-oc'o-on — note the name, there is a sequel awaiting associ- 
ated with this priest of Neptune — runs down to discounte- 
nance the project. His speech is full of prophet's wisdom 
and fire. One sententious phrase of it has become a proverb : 

Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. 

Mr. Conington translates : 

What e'er it be, a Greek I fear 
Though presents in his hand he bear. 

Literally translated : " I fear the Greeks, even bringing 
gifts." Mr. Morris says laboriously: 

Whatso it is, the Danaan folk, yea gift-bearing, I fear. 

The archaic quaintness everywhere infused by Mr. Morris 
into his version, is not justified by any corresponding qual- 
ity in Virgil. The enforced accent on -ing in " gift-bearing " 
is a thing to be endured rather than to be enjoyed. From 
Dryden, you would not suspect that there was any thing 



Virgil. 267 



worthy of note in the original. Nothing could be more un- 
conscious and commonplace : 

Trust not their presents nor admit the horse. 

The disposition to be made of the horse hangs in doubt, 
when a Greek captive is brought in who plays a very deep 
part. Si'non is the man's name. On the desperate chance 
of getting himself believed in a most improbable tale, this 
man has risked his life by thus throwing himself into the 
power of the Trojans. He pretends to have escaped from 
dreadful death at the hands of his own countrymen, having 
been, as he says, destined by them to perish, a human sacri- 
fice, for their safe return from Troy. Sin on treats the Tro- 
jans to a rich abuse of Ulysses, which naturally, however 
illogically, wins their trust for the slanderer. Interrupting 
himself with exquisite art, he cries: 

But why a tedious tale repeat, 

To stay you from your morsel sweet ? 

If all are equal, Greek and Greek, 

Enough — your tardy vengeance wreak ; 

My death will Ithacus delight, 

And Atreus' sons the boon requite. 

The whole incident of Sinon's treachery is consummately 
well managed by Virgil, and Mr. Conington's translation is 
so admirable, that we have to put force upon ourselves to 
abridge it as we must. The upshot is that Sinon gets him- 
self believed. His fetters are stricken off and, at Priam's 
kindly challenge, he has his desired chance to cheat the 
Trojans to the full, under sanction of protestations volun- 
teered by him with gratuitous eloquence of perjury. Tell 
us honestly, Sinon, Priam says, What does the horse mean ? 

Sinon's satisfaction to the old king's curiosity is ingen- 
iously fabricated. He says that Pallas turned against the 
Greeks, aggrieved by profanation done to her image at the 
hands of ruthless Ulysses and Ty-di'des. These chieftains 
had plucked the sacred statue — Palladium, it was called — 



268 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

from its seat in the temple in Troy, and stained it with 
blood. The Greek prophet Calchas, [Kal'kas,] so Sinon 
glibly relates, assures his countrymen that they must return 
home and there renew the omens, or they will never take Troy. 
Meantime they fashion the colossal horse in Pallas's honor, 

An image for an image given 
To pacify offended Heaven. 

Calchas, Sinon with skillful surplusage of lying, says, bade 
the Greeks rear the horse so high that the Trojans could 
not get it through their city gates, lest, taken within, it should 
make Troy impregnable, and endanger Greece. 

To second and support the lithe lying of Sinon, a ghastly 
omen fell. Now comes in the story of Laocoon, which is too 
famous and too characteristic of Virgil not to be given to 
our readers without retrenchment, as Virgil tells it : 

Laocoon, named as Neptune's priest, 

Was offering up the victim beast, 

When lo ! from Tenedos — I quail, 

E'en now, at telling of the tale — 

Two monstrous serpents stem the tide, 

And shoreward through the stillness glide. 

Amid the waves they rear their breasts, 

And toss on high their sanguine crests ; 

The hind part coils along the deep, 

And undulates with sinuous sweep. 

The lashed spray echoes : now they reach 

The inland belted by the beach, 

And rolling bloodshot eyes of fire, 

Dart their forked tongue, and hiss for ire. 

We fly distraught ; unswerving they 

Toward Laocoon hold their way ; 

First round his two young sons they wreathe, 

And grind their limbs with savage teeth : 

Then, as with arms he comes to aid, 

The wretched father they invade 

And twine in giant folds ; twice round 

His stalwart waist their spires are wound, 

Twice round his neck, while over all 

Their heads and crests tower high and tall. 

He strains his strength their knots to tear, 

While gore and slime his fillets smear, 

And to the unregardful skies 

Sends up his agonizing cries : 






Virgil. 



269 



A wounded bull such moaning makes, 
"When from his neck the axe he shakes, 
Ill-aimed, and from the altar breaks. 
The twin destroyers take their flight 
To Pallas' temple on the height ; 
There by the goddess' feet concealed 
They lie and nestle 'neath her shield. 




LAOCOON. 



No wonder that the Trojans now, seeing an apparent pun- 
ishment so dire befall Laocoon, are shocked into unquali- 



270 Preparatory Latin Course i?i English. 

fied credit of Sinon's tale. With resistless enthusiasm, they 
rush to drag the fateful horse within the walls. Virgil's de- 
scription of this madness and this action is instinct with fire. 
It is almost impossible to refrain from swelling our volume 
to admit it unabridged. But our readers will have, many of 
them, to get Mr. Conington's version, and read the whole 
^Eneid for themselves. The book is accessible in comely 
republication, and is sold at a reasonable rate, by Messrs. 
A. C. Armstrong & Son — who ought, for so admirable a 
work, to feel, from the public, demand enough to justify 
them in making the plates of the book as nearly perfect as 
possible. (Let them, also, strengthen this volume of transla- 
tion by twinning with it its fellow in felicity and in easy su- 
premacy over every rival, Mr. Worsley's version of the 
Odyssey.) 

The sequel of the contrivance of the Wooden Horse is 
thus told : 

And now from Tenedos set free 

The Greeks are sailing on the sea, 

Bound for the shore where erst they lay, 

Beneath the still moon's friendly ray : 

When in a moment leaps to sight 

On the king's ship the signal light, 

And Sinon, screened by partial fate, 

Unlocks the pine-wood prison's gate. 

The horse its charge to aid restores 

And forth the armed invasion pours. 

Thessander, Sthenelus, the first, 

Slide down the rope : Ulysses curst, 

Thoas and Acamas are there, 

And great Pelides' youthful heir, 

Machaon, Menelaus, last 

Epeus, who the plot forecast. 

They seize the city, buried deep 

In floods of revelry and sleep, 

Cut down the warders of the gates, 

And introduce their conscious mates. 

That same night yEneas, in his sleep, is visited by a vision 
of Hector. Hector bids him flee from the doomed city and 
carry Troy to other shores. The frightful hurly-burly of that 
night's confused fight and massacre, mixed with conflagra- 



Virgil. 271 

tion, is powerfully described by Virgil, who, as usual, is pow- 
erfully translated by Mr. Conington. iEneas wakes, and 
climbs to the palace-roof. At first the flaming houses fill his 
sight. His ear next is assailed with sound : 

Then come the clamor and the blare, 
And shouts and clarions rend the air. 

Virgil's line enjoys great renown : 

Exoritur clamorque virum clangorque tubarum. 

Any one who will read it aloud, pronouncing the Latin after 
his own fashion, whatever that fashion be, will find his 
mouth filled with words, and his ear filled with sound. It is 
a fine example of consonance between sound and sense. 
Mr. Morris, in his line-for-line style, renders thus : 

The shout of men ariseth now, and blaring of the horn. 
Tennyson's rolling crescendo, in the Ode on Wellington, 

Followed up in valley and glen 
With blare of bugle, clamor of men, 
Roll of cannon, clash of arms, 
And England pouring on her foes, 

owes probably its second line to a recollection of Virgil here. 
A priest of Apollo, escaped from the marauding Greeks, 
makes his way to the house, and iEneas asks him what of 
the night. The answer contains two memorable lines : 

Venit summa dies et ineluctabile tempus 
Dardanise. Fuimus Troes, fuit Ilium et ingens 
Gloria Teucrorum. 

Conington renders : 

'Tis come, our fated day of death. 
We have been Trojans : Troy has been : 
She sat, but sits no more, a queen. 
Mr. Morris : 

Time was, the Trojans were ; time was, and Ilium stood ; time was, 
And glory of the Teucrian folk ! 

No translation could well reproduce the solemn and lofty 
prophet-like effect of the original, with its melancholy pro- 



272 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

longation of words, its dense brevity withal, its inimitable 
choice of order in syntax. Literally it reads: "Has come 
the final day, and the not to be struggled out of occasion, 
to Dardania. We have been, we Trojans ; it has been, the 
city of Ilium, and the boundless glory of the sons of Teucer." 
The perfect tenses, "We have been," and "Troy has 
been," are examples, magnificent examples, of the pregnant 
idiom with which the Romans sometimes expressed great 
calamity by stopping short of statement, and trusting to 
irresistible inference. We English-speakers say, " He is no 
more; he is dead ;" the Romans sometime said, " He has 
been; he has lived" — the ap-o-si-o-pe'sis, the refusal to 
speak, being more eloquent than declaration. 

Among the touching incidents of 
the last night of Troy,with which the 
teeming invention of Virgil crowds 
his swift-revolving kaleidoscopic nar- 
rative, there is, perhaps, none so pa- 
thetic as that of aged Priam's girding 
on the armor of his youth, to sally out 
and do battle with the foe. Hecuba, 
his wife, espies him in his panoply, 
and exclaims at the noble madness 
of the old man. One line of her ex- 
clamation is, almost literally, a jewel, 
such as Tennyson (in a phrase, itself 
also such a jewel) describes in The 
Priam. Princess, 

jewels five-words-long 
That on the stretched forefinger of all Time 
Sparkle forever : 

Non tali auxilio nee defensoribus istis. 

The full Virgilian sentence adds the two words, Tempus 
egetj the sense being, " Not aid such as yours, nor defenders 




Virgil. 273 

like you, does the occasion demand." Some, however, of the 
best Latin scholars find here a meaning considerably differ- 
ent, namely, " Not aid of such a sort as arms afford, nor weap- 
ons like those you bring, will answer the present need," (we 
must pray rather than fight.) Mr. Conington, accordingly, 
with bold freedom, translates : 

times so dire 
Bent knees, not lifted arms, require — 

a rendering which, even be the general meaning granted, the 
ambiguity in the word "arms," and the doubtful symbolism 
of" lifted/' qualifying "arms," combine to make not entirely 
happy. Difference of view on a sentence apparently so simple 
may surprise our readers. None the less, it is part of desirable 
knowledge to know that such difference of view exists. The 
applications are manifold, in which this famous line of Vir- 
gil's continues, and will always continue, to be quoted in 
all literatures that have any relation with the literature of 
Rome. 

The end of Priam comes by the hand of Pyrrhus, son of 
Achilles. Priam had just seen his own son Po-li'tes slain 
at his very feet by Pyrrhus, and with aged ire had up- 
braided the slayer as degenerate offspring of an illustrious 
sire. He had even hurled against Pyrrhus an impotent 
weapon. Now a few lines of Virgil according to Conington : 

Then Pyrrhus : " Take the news below, 
And to my sire Achilles go : 
Tell him of his degenerate seed, 
And that and this my bloody deed. 
Now die : " and to the altar-stone 

Along the marble floor 
He dragged the father sliddering on 

E'en in his child's own gore : 
His left hand in his hair he wreathed, 

While with the right he plied 
His flashing sword, and hilt-deep sheathed 

Within the old man's side. 
So Priam's fortunes closed at last : 
So passed he, seeing as he passed 
12* 



274 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

His Troy in flames, his royal tower 
Laid low in dust by hostile power. 
Who once o'er land and peoples proud 
Sat, while before him Asia bowed : 
Now on the shore behold him dead, 
A nameless trunk, a trunkless head. 

The last line of Conington affords an admirable instance of 
this accomplished translator's quality as rhetorician rather 
than poet. What consummate rhetoric is 

A nameless trunk, a trunkless head ! 

The sense is exactly Virgil's, the rhetoric exactly Coning- 
ton's. That repetition, in transposed order, of the word 
trunk — it is brilliant, but it is too brilliant. It is rhetoric 
rather than poetry. 

No wonder pious ^Eneas was horrified. No wonder he 
thought of his own father Anchises. In his craze, he was 
tempted to lift his hand against Argive Helen, seen by him 
crouching in the temple of Vesta. But his mother Venus 
came between, confessing the goddess in her august Olym- 
pian grace, and ^Eneas was saved acknowledging to a woman 
the sorry prowess of a woman slain by his hand. Venus ex- 
horted her son to look after his father, his wife, and his boy. 
She promised him safe conduct to his own dwelling. His 
eye-sight should be clarified to see with more than mortal 

vision : 

That vision showed me Neptune's town 

In blazing ruin sinking down : 

As rustics strive with many a stroke 

To fell some venerable oak ; 

It still keeps nodding to its doom, 

Still bows its head, and shakes its plume, 

Till, by degrees o'ercome, one groan 

It heaves, and on the hill lies prone. 

Mr. Conington transforms the tree in this comparison from 
mountain-ash (Virgil's species) to oak. 

Have we perhaps a reader here or there who will remem- 
ber that in our preceding chapter, " The City and the 



Virgil. 275 

People," the author himself used this very image of Virgil's, 
the slow-descending oak, to set forth the decline and fall of 
the Roman Empire ? It was either a coincidence of inde- 
pendent thought in two writers, or else it was a case of un- 
remembered influence received by the later from the elder. 
However, the image as used by Virgil illustrates the fall of a 
city, by conflagration, accomplished in a night ; the image as 
used by the present writer illustrated the decadence of an 
empire slowly proceeding through centuries of time. Ap- 
propriately, Virgil's tree, symbolizing Troy, falls under strokes 
of an axe ; while our oak, symbolizing the Roman Empire, 
was conceived of as succumbing to secular influences of 
natural decay. 

The saviour son ^Eneas has trouble with his spirited old 
father, who refuses to be saved. Whereupon iEneas is as 
spirited as he, and, unrestrained by his wife Cre-u'-sa's en- 
treaty, is on the point of rushing forth again into the street 
brim with its battle and flame, when, behold a prodigy! 
A lovely lambent flame lights on the head of little lulus, as 
his mother is eloquently presenting him in argument to his 
father. The parents try to quench it, but prophetic grand*, 
father Anchises is enraptured at the sight. He prays for 
confirmation of the omen. A clap of thunder on the left, 
and a sliding meteor above the palace-roof! Anchises 
chants— but we should profane a holy phrase with such 
an application — we were about to say his " Nunc dimittis " 
—Anchises, in short, now consents to flee with ^Eneas, The 
pious son arranges a place of meeting for Creusa, outside the 
city, and starts, bearing his father on his shoulders and 
leading his boy by the hand— an immortal picture of filial 
fidelity. 

Creusa got parted from her company and met a fate un- 
known. .^Eneas did what a faithful husband was bound to 
do; he returned to the city in search of his wife. Her 
specter met him and bade him fare well. She was not to be 



276 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



his companion. He tried to embrace her, but he embraced 
emptiness. ^Eneas was wifeless. 

The second book ends with ^Eneas's return to his father 
and son, where he had left them in order to seek his wife. 
He there found a number of Trojans ready to join their fate 
with his. 

The third book is crowded with matter; but we must dis- 
pose of it very briefly. This we may the better do, since it 
it is pretty close imitation of the Odyssey, and the Odyssey 
has in a former volume of this series been somewhat largely 
represented. 

^Eneas, in this third book, tells of seven years' wanderings 




SCYLLA. 



with his fleet — seven years, short by the one winter which 
the wanderers spend, to begin with, in building ships. The 
season following, the Trojans visit Thrace, and found a 
town. Hence they are driven forth by a dire prodigy. 
^Eneas, sacrificing to Jupiter, plucks, to garland the altars, a 
sapling which from the wound trickles gore. A second 



Virgil. 277 

time, and a third, this happens, and the third time a " lament- 
able sound " issues from the earth. It cries to ^Eneas : 

Trojan, not alien is the blood 
That oozes from the uptorn wood. 
Fly this fell soil, these greedy shores : 
The voice you hear is Polydore's. 

Polydore, (Polydorus,) it seems, was a Trojan who had been 
sent by Priam, bearing treasure to be stored in trust with the 
Thracian king — this, in preparation for the downfall feared 
of Troy. The Thracian king turned traitor, and, making an 
end of Polydorus, seized his trust of treasure. Now comes 
a phrase of Virgil's that men often quote, " auri sacra fames" 
" accursed hunger for gold " — so literally, but since thirst 
and hunger are twin appetites guardian of life, Conington 
is well enough justified in seeking his rhyme, by saying, as 
he does : 

Fell lust of gold ! abhorred, accurst ! 
What will not men to slake such thirst ? 

(The last line has its equivalent in the Latin.) English 
readers looking at the Latin word "sacra" may naturally be 
surprised to see it translated (the opposite of what it should 
seem to mean) "accursed." "Sacred," rather, you would 
be inclined to guess. This is the explanation : The word 
first means, " dedicated, devoted to the gods." Then " de- 
voted in order to be destroyed," whence, by easy transition, 
"accursed," "detestable." 

From Thrace faring, ^Eneas next came to Delos, the fable 
of which is that it was a floating island until fixed and 
anchored by Phoebus Apollo to be the seat of his oracle. 

In Delos, ^Eneas prays to Apollo. With memorable 
pathos he calls himself and his companions by the repeated 
phrase, our readers will remember it, 

relliquias Danaum atque immitis Achilli. 

^Eneas gets an answer which Anchises interprets into sail- 
ing directions to the company for Crete, whither accordingly 



278 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

the Trojans sail, only to suffer there from pestilence, until, 
about to send back again for instruction explanatory of in- 
struction, they receive distinct warning from their own 
household gods, brought with them in Anchises' hands from 
Ilium, that Italy was their true destination. . Another chance 
is thus offered for a strain of prediction about the future 
glories of Rome. The appetite for this sort of thing that 
Virgil could calculate on with Romans in general, and with 
the emperor in particular, must have been immense. Prob- 
ably it grew by what Virgil fed it on. Praise well served is 
an extremely dainty dish. Such Frederick the Great found it, 
when Voltaire was the cook, accomplished as that French- 
man was, to more than the national degree of skill in this 
culinary art. 

So to sea once more. Out of sight of land they find them- 
selves, those Trojans ; and Virgil, through ^Eneas, makes a 
point of it. His expression, 

coelum undique et undique pontus, 

— sky everywhere and everywhere sea, is famous. The chi- 
asm in it, that is, the transposed construction — the word for 
" everywhere," as you will observe, occupying exchanged 
positions in the two clauses — is a fine stroke of literary art. 

Of the Ulyssean adventures that befell yEneas on his voy- 
age, we skip, among others, the incident of the harpies, and 
come to the story of the Cyclops. But we ought to tell our 
readers that meantime it has chanced to iEneas to meet an 
old Trojan friend in Hel'e-nus, who, singularly enough, has 
mated with An-drom'a-che, Hector's wife, and, by a variety of 
circumstances has, with her, succeeded, he a Trojan, to a 
Grecian crown. From Helenus, acting in his quality of 
priest to Apollo, ^Eneas gets yet again a prophecy of what 
awaits him. This time, however, the prediction concerns 
itself chiefly with the immediate future, the period, namely, 
of ^Eneas's wanderings still to be accomplished. 



Virgil. 



279 



Virgil, with obvious ingenuity of joinery, pieces his own 
account of the Cyclops upon that of his master. He makes 
^Eneas encounter a forlorn Greek — it is a wonder that, with 
the Trojans, the thought of Sinon did not inopportunely 
occur, to be the instant death of the man — who says that 
his fellows in misery inadveitently left him behind, flying 
wildly from the dreadful neighborhood. The Greek — he had 
a long name, Ach'e-men'i-des [AK] — describes the monster 
Cyclops and his den. 




SIRENS. 



Let us have a change. We go for this once from Mr. 
Conington , to Mr. Morris. The change will perhaps be 
grateful to some readers. 

A house of blood and bloody meat, most huge from end to end, 

Mirky within : high up aloft star-smiting to behold 

Is he himself ; — such bane, O God, keep thou from field and fold 

Scarce may a man look on his face ; no word to him is good ; 

On wretches' entrails doth he feed and black abundant blood. 

Myself I saw him of our folk two hapless bodies take 

In his huge hand, whom straight he fell athwart a stone to break 

As there he lay upon his back ; I saw the threshold swim 

With spouted blood, I saw him grind each bloody dripping limb, 



280 Preparatoj-y Latin Coarse in English. 

I saw the joints amidst his teeth all warm and quivering still. 

— He payed therefor, for never might UI3 sses bear such ill, 

Nor was he worser than himself in such a pinch bestead : 

For when with victual satiate, deep sunk in wine, his head 

Fell on his breast, and there he lay enormous through the den, 

Snorting out gore amidst his sleep, with gobbets of the men 

And mingled blood and wine ; then we sought the great gods with prayer. 

And drew the lots, and one and all crowded about him there, 

And bored out with a sharpened pike the eye that used to lurk 

Enormous lonely 'neath his brow o'erhanging grim and mirk. 

While the wretched Greek was yet speaking, Pol'y-phe'mus, 
the blinded Cyclops, appears. Conington : 

A pine-tree, plucked from earth, makes strong 
His tread, and guides his steps along. 

Readers of Milton will recall (" Paradise Lost," i, 292) 

His spear, to equal which the tallest pine, 
Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the mast 
Of some great ammiral, were but a wand, 
He walked with to support uneasy steps 
Over the burning marie, 

which presents the same picture — in Milton heightened to 
correspond justly with the larger and sublimer scale of the 
general representation. 

The last thing told by yEneas before the incident of his 
landing on the Carthaginian coast is the death of his father 
Anchises, which, like the dutiful son that y£neas was, and 
affectionate, he bewails in sweet and pathetic verse. 

The feast was ended, and the long recital of ^Eneas. 

The fourth book is devoted to the sad tale of Dido and 
her fatal passion for her guest. The episode is interesting, but 
it has not the interest of a story of love, such as Christianity, 
with its gospel of woman's equality with man, has taught us 
moderns to understand love between the sexes. Of that love, 
pagan antiquity knew nothing. The relation between Dido 
and iEneas was not one of true love, but one of passion, in 
which the passion was chiefly on the hapless woman's side. 
We moderns cannot enter into the sympathy of it. Dido 



Virgil. 281 

you pity indeed, but hardly respect. You feel more satis- 
faction in heartily execrating ^Eneas with his everlastingly 
applauded piety. You wish he were a little less pious and 
a little more honorable. 

There are celebrated passages of fine poetry in this book 
which we must lay before our readers ; but poor Dido's moon- 
struck maunderings to her confidant sister Anna, together 
with her love-sick wheedling of ^Eneas kind, and her crazy 
objurgation of yEneas treacherous — this detail may well be 
spared. Virgil does it all with great skill, displaying in it 
great knowledge of the human heart. But the story rather 
revolts the modern taste. Let us pass it. The short of it 
is that Dido helplessly burns for ^Eneas, that ^Eneas ruins 
Dido and deserts her, and that then Dido takes refuge in 
suicide, having first provided to perish in a funeral pyre that 
shall flame high enough to be a baleful sign to ^Eneas off at 
sea. Thus is a quasi-historic reason found or feigned by 
Virgil for the immortal enmity that subsisted between Car- 
thaginian and Roman blood. It should be said that the 
rascal Olympian divinities come in to be, as usual, mutually 
antagonist artificers of fraud. 

After Dido's fall, she seeks at once to cover her disgrace : 

She calls it marriage now ; such name 
She chooses to conceal her shame. 

What follows is perhaps as famous a passage as any in an- 
cient poetry. It is a magnificent description of fame, report, 
or rumor personified — gossip, we might familiarly call the 
creature : 

Now through the towns of Libya's sons 

Her progress Fame begins, 
Fame than who never plague that runs 

Its way more swiftly wins ; 
Her very motion lends her power ; 
She flies and waxes every hour. 
At first she shrinks, and cowers for dread : 

Ere long she soars on high : 
Upon the ground she plants her tread, 

Her forehead in the sky. 



282 



Preparatory Latin Coiirse in English. 



Wroth with Olympus, parent Earth 
Brought forth the monster to the light, 

Last daughter of the giant birth, 
With feet and rapid wings for flight. 

Huge, terrible, gigantic Fame ! 

For every plume that clothes her frame 

An eye beneath the feather peeps, 

A tongue rings loud, an ear upleaps. 

Hurtling 'twixt earth and heaven she flies 

By night, nor bows to sleep her eyes ; 

Perched on a roof or tower by day 

She fills great cities with dismay ; 

How oft soc'er the truth she tell, 

She loves a falsehood all too well. 

A nice critical assay would perhaps find in the foregoing 

brilliant lines from Virgil 
as much alloy of rhetoric 
as verse will bear and still 
keep to a high standard 
of poetical purity. 

Here is another fine pas- 
sage. It is descriptive of 
night — the calm night on 
which, while wakeful Di- 
do communed with her- 
self about ways of yet re- 
gaining her lover, that 
lover, himself first roused 
by Mercury, messenger 
of Jove, roused in turn 
his men, and faithlessly, 
though piously, set sail for 
Italy. The contrast of the 

universal quiet, in a few strokes so strongly depicted, with 

Dido's unrest is very effective : 

'Tis night : earth's tired ones taste the balm, 
The precious balm of sleep, 
And in the forest there is calm, 
And on the savage deep: 




MERCURY CONVEYING THE MESSAGE 
OF JUPITER. 



Virgil. 283 

. The stars are in their middle flight : 

The fields are hushed : each bird or beast 
That dwells beside the silver lake 
Or haunts the tangles of the brake 
In placid slumber lies, released 
From trouble by the touch of night ; 
All but the hapless queen. 

Queen Dido wakes and soliloquizes; ^Eneas sleeps and 
dreams. He dreaming, Mercury presents himself to him 
with a message. 

Away to sea ! a woman's will 
Is changeful and uncertain still, 

is the gist and the close of Mercury's communication. The 
Latin almost translates itself, to the English reader : 

Varium et mutabile semper 
Femina — 

" a thing moody and mutable ever — woman, " we may ren- 
der it literally. It was, of course, a slant at Dido through 
a generalization assailing her sex. A fit brave sentiment 
truly for such a man as ^Eneas to meditate ! Compare and 
contrast with that of Virgil this of Scott's : 

O woman ! in our hours of ease, 
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, 
And variable as the shade 
By the light quivering aspen made ; 
When pain and anguish wring the brow, 
A ministering angel thou ! 

The difference of sentiment is, of course, partly a difference 
created by the difference of occasion ; but are we not all 
conscious that there is a feeling in Scott of which, less per- 
haps by his own individual character than by the fortune of 
his historic position, Virgil was incapable ? Human thought 
and feeling have been marvelously transposed by Christian- 
ity to a different key. Here, however, is a sentiment that 
would not read out of place in Scott, attributed to one of his 
proud fierce chieftain warriors : 



284 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



Let the false Dardan feel the blaze 
That burns me pouring on his gaze, 
And bear along, to cheer his way, 
The funeral presage of to-day. 

These are the suicide queen-lover's very last words, ^neas, 
on his part, pitied Dido, perhaps dropped some tears over 




DIDOS DEATH. 



her fate — about as he might pour a libation to the gods and 
think of it no more — pious soul, intent he on his mission of 
founding an empire. 

The fifth book is largely occupied with an elaborate ac- 
count of games celebrated on a friendly shore by the Trojans 
under the imperio-paternal eye of ^Eneas, in honor of the 
anniversary of his father Anchises' death. They had a galley- 
race, a foot-race, a boxing-match, a trial of archery, and, to 
crown all, a gallant competition of horsemanship in mimic 
tournament, on the part of the boys. Virgil here accounts 
for the origin of the Ludus Trojanus, a public game so called 
prevalent in his own time at Rome — an adjustment of his 
poem to the popular pleasure quite characteristic of the 
genius and complaisance of this pre-eminently national poet. 

We shall not follow the vicissitudes of the fortune of the 



Virgil. 



28s 



sports engaged in by the Trojans, which, however, we may- 
say, in passing, are cunningly shaken up and fitted in the 
kaleidoscope of deft invention. There is mischance and 
laughter — Roman laughter, not Greek — mixed with the am- 
bitions, the strivings, the victories, the defeats, that attend the 
games. " Good ^Eneas," as Mr. Conington, partly in defer- 
ence to modern taste perhaps, and partly in concession to 
the needs of his measure, translates Virgil's reiterated " pious 
iEneas " — good, or pious, ^Eneas, (pious, we, for our part, 




CESTUS. 

should say, rather than good,) makes every body fairly happy 
at last by lavishly distributing gifts all around — to the victo- 
rious as prizes, to the defeated as solaces. 

Now let us be free to go skimming over the surface of 
book fifth, and take off the sunwia, as perhaps the Latin- 
speakers might say, the cream, say we, of the rhetoric and 
poetry which it contains. 

There are several consecutive lines standing near the out- 
set of this book which Virgil very closely repeats from book 
third. Mr. Conington translates as if the repetition were 
more nearly exact than it really is. The fact would seem to 
be that Virgil, conscious of repeating himself, aimed at va- 
riation. For instance, Conington translates both times, 

On every side the watery plain, 
On every side the expanse of sky, 



286 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

whereas Virgil once says that, and the other time says, 

On every side the expanse of sky, 
On every side the watery plain, 

using, however, in the two cases different words for " watery 
plain," that is, the sea. One is a little surprised that Mr. 
Morris here did not obey the logic of his method in trans- 
lation and vary his order of words to follow Virgil's varied 
order. 

In the part about the galley-race (this is a rowing-match) 
occurs that memorable expression which some readers per- 
haps will recollect the present writer alluded to in applica- 
tion to Marius. It is very neatly rendered by Mr. Conington : 

They can, because they think they can. 

Confidence of success certainly is a great help to succeeding. 
Possunt, quia posse videntur 

is the Virgil of it — ''they are able because they seem [to 
themselves] to be able." 

At the end of the trial in archery — the first bowman has 
sent his arrow into the wood of the mast to which the dove 
was tied, the second has with his shaft cut the binding cord, 
a third has pierced the flying bird in air; happy climax of 
marksmanship, for the marksman happy, unhappy for the 
mark ! — at the end of all this, we say, Acestes, the host of 
the Trojan wanderers, disappointed of his chance to shoot, 
discharges his arrow aimlessly into the sky. Hereupon a 
prodigy — for which we moderns care nothing, but the simile 
that describes it is worth quoting : 

E'en in the mid expanse of skies 
The arrow kindles as it flies, 
Behind it draws a fiery glare, 
Then wasting, ranishes in air: 
So stars, dislodged, athwart the night 
Career and trail a length of light. 



Virgil. 287 

Virgil's similes are thick-sown, not however with unwise 
plenty, through his verse. They are almost always lucky 
likenesses, and luckily set off, luckily, with that careful good 
luck which is called curiosa felicitas — curious felicity. 

The Trojans' stay with Acestes is marked by a sinister in- 
cident. The Trojan women being apart by themselves dur- 
ing the games are instigated by a disguised emissary from 
Juno to set fire to the fleet. A timely shower from Jupiter 
stays the conflagration, but not before four ships have been 
consumed. ^Eneas decides to build a town on the coast for 
those of his company who prefer not to go farther. With 
embraces and with tears they part, those who go, from those 
who stay. On the smooth sail to Cumse, Pal'i-nu'rus, the pilot 
of .^Eneas's vessel, falls overboard asleep and is drowned. It 
was the trick of the god Sleep. So ends the fifth book. 

The sixth book is a long and splendid tract of poetry. The 
matter of it is .^Eneas's descent into Hades. This descent is 
accomplished with much antecedent as well as accompany- 
ing circumstance and ceremony. Resort is had to the resi- 
dence of the Sibyl at Cumse (Cuma). This famous mythical 
personage is a well-known subject in the modern painter's 
art. She is thus introduced by Virgil : 

Within the mountain's hollow side 
A cavern stretches high and wide ; 
A hundred entries thither lead ; 
A hundred voices thence proceed, 
Each uttering fortli the Sibyl's rede. 
The sacred threshold now they trod : 
" Pray for an answer ! pray ! the god," 

She cries, " the god is nigh ! " 
And as before the doors in view 
She stands, her visage pales its hue, 
Her locks dishevelled fly, 
Her breath comes thick, her wild heart glows, 
Dilating as the madness grows, 
Her form looks larger to the eye, 
Unearthly peals her deep-toned cry, 
As breathing nearer and more near 
The god comes rushing on his seer. 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



" So slack " cries she " at work divine ? 
Pray, Trojan, pray ! not else the shrine 
Its spell-bound silence breaks." 

Thus adjured, ^Eneas fell to praying with pious pagan zeal. 
The result was marked and immediate. The maiden seer is 
as drunk as a pantheist with god, that is, with Apollo: 

The seer, impatient of control, 

Raves in the cavern vast, 
And madly struggles from her soul 

The incumbent power to cast : 
He, mighty Master, plies the more 
Her foaming mouth, all chafed and sore, 
Tames her wild heart with plastic hand, 
And makes her docile to command. 
Now, all untouched, the hundred gates 
Fly open, and proclaim the fates. 

The fates are trouble, ending in conquest, for ^Eneas. The 

prophet-maid has a dreadful convulsion all the time, which 

^Eneas waits to see a little composed before he boastfully 

prefers his request to be admitted to the lower world. The 

Sibyl told him, in words that have become as famous as any 

in poetry, 

facilis descensus Averni, 
Etc, 

which Mr. Conington translates: 

The journey down to the abyss 

Is prosperous and light : 
The palace-gates of gloomy Dis 

Stand open day and night: 
But upward to retrace the way 
And pass into the light of day 
There comes the stress of labor ; this 

May task a hero's might. 

She uses powerfully deterrent language, but bids y£neas, if 
he still will try the journey, go into the woods and look till 
he finds a certain mystic golden bough which may serve as 
passport to the regions of the dead. With much ado, this 
branch is found. Then sacrifice is offered and, with a 
warning cry, "Back, ye unhallowed," to all besides, she in- 
vites ^Eneas to follow her and plunges into the cave. 



Virgil. 289 

_ 

Here Virgil puts up a prayer in his own behalf for per- 
mission to go on and tell what he has resolved on telling : 

Eternal Powers, whose sway controls 

The empire of departed souls, 

Ye too, throughout whose wide domain 

Black Night and grisly Silence reign, 

Hoar Chaos, awful Phlegethon, 

What ear has heard let tongue make known : 

Vouchsafe your sanction, nor forbid 

To utter things in darkness hid. 

Permitted or not, Virgil proceeds with his disclosure. Of 
^Eneas and his guide, he says : 

Along the illimitable shade 

Darkling and lone their way they made, 

Through the vast kingdom of the dead, 

An empty void, though tenanted : 

So travelers in a forest move 

With but the uncertain moon above, 

Beneath her niggard light, 
When Jupiter has hid from view 
The heaven, and Nature's every hue 

Is lost in blinding night. 

The shapes that haunt, as porters and portresses, about 
the entrance of Hades are a grim group : 

At Orcus' portals hold their lair 
Wild Sorrow and avenging Care ; 
And pale Diseases cluster there, 

And pleasureless Decay, 
Foul Penury, and Fears that kill, 
And Hunger, counselor of ill, 

A ghastly presence they : 
Suffering and Death the threshold keep 
And with them Death's blood-brother, Sleep : 
111 Joys with their seducing spells 

And deadly War are at the door ; 
The Furies couch in iron cells 
And Discord maddens and rebels ; 

Her snake-locks hiss, her wreaths drip gore. 

The description of the journey proceeds : 

The threshold passed, the road leads on 
To Tartarus and to Acheron. 
At distance rolls the infernal flood, 
Seething and swollen with turbid mud, 
13 



290 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



And into dark Cocytus pours 

The burden of its oozy stores. 

Grim, squalid, foul, with aspect dire, 

His eye-balls each a globe of fire. 

The wateiy passage Charon keeps, 

Sole warden of those murky deeps : 

A sordid mantle round him thrown 

Girds breast and shoulder like a zone. 

He plies the pole with dexterous ease, 

Or sets the sail to catch the breeze, 

Fenying the legions of the dead 

In bark of dusky iron-red, 

Now marked with age ; but heavenly powers 

Have fresher, greener eld than ours. 

Towards the ferry and the shore 

The multitudinous phantoms pour; 

Matrons, and men, and heroes dead, 

And boys and maidens, yet unwed, 

And youths who funeral fires have fed 

Before their parents' eye: 
Dense as the leaves that from the treen 
Float clown when autumn first is keen, 
Or as the birds that thickly massed 
Fly landward from the ocean vast, 
Driven over sea by wintry blast 

To seek a sunnier sky. 
Each in pathetic suppliance stands, 

So may he first be ferried o'er, 
And stretches out his helpless hands 

In yearning for the farther shore: 
The ferryman, austere and stern, 
Takes these and those in varying turn, 
While other some he scatters wide, 
And chases from the river side. 
^Eneas, startled at the scene, 
Cries, " Tell me, priestess, what may mean 

This concourse to the shore ? 
What cause can shade from shade divide 
That these should leave the river side, 

Those sweep the dull waves o'er? " 
The ancient seer made brief reply: 
*' Anchises' seed, of those on high 

The undisputed heir, 
Cocytus' pool, and Styx you see. 
The stream by whose dread majesty 

No god will falsely swear. 
A helpless and unburied crew 
Is this that swarms before your view : 
The boatman, Charon : whom the wave 
Is carrying, these have found their grave. 



Virgil. 



291 



For never man may travel o'er 
That dark and dreadful flood before 

His bones are in the urn. 
E'en till a hundred years are told 
They wander shivering in the cold : 
At length admitted they behold 

The stream for which they yearn." 

There is now an encounter, on ^Eneas's part, with pilot 
Palinurus, disconsolate because his corpse lies unburied. 
The Sibyl promises the shade that the coast where he per- 
ished shall bear a name associated with his own — whereat 
his grief is comforted ! What an irony, such comfort — irony 
probably not intended by Virgil, who was no cynic — on post- 
humous fame ! 

The two adventurers, ^Eneas and the Sibyl, come in due 




CHARON LANDING GHOSTS FROM HIS BOAT. 

course to the banks of the Styx. Charon, the infernal ferry- 
man, challenges ^Eneas, but the Sibyl speaks the hero's 
name and shows the golden branch. This satisfies Charon, 
and he lets ^Eneas step into his boat. The crazy bark sinks 
deep under living weight, but they all get safe across. It 
was to a gruesome place : 

Lo ! Cerberus with three-throated bark 

Makes all the region ring, 
Stretched out along the cavern dark 

That fronts their entering. 



292 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

The seer perceived his monstrous head 

All bristling o'er with snakes uproused, 
And toward him flings a sop of bread 

With poppy-seed and honey drowsed. 
He with his triple jaws dispread 

Snaps up the morsel as it falls, 
Relaxes his huge frame as dead, 

And o'er the cave extended sprawls. 
The sentry thus in slumber drowned, 
./Eneas takes the vacant ground, 
And quickly passes from the side 
Of the irremeable tide. 

(" Ir-re'me-a-ble " (not to be repassed) is Virgil's own stately- 
Latin polysyllable, irrcmcabilis, transferred almost without 
change into English. In making this impressive transfer 
Conington follows Dryden.) 

Hark ! as they enter, shrieks arise, 

And wailing great and sore, 
The souls of infants uttering cries 

At ingress of the door, 
Whom, portionless of life's sweet bliss, 

From mother's breast untimely torn, 
The black day hurried to the abyss 

And plunged in darkness soon as born. 
Next those are placed whom Slander's breath 
By false arraignment did to death. 
Nor lacks e'en here the law's appeal, 
Nor sits no judge the lots to deal. 
Sage Minos shakes the impartial urn, 

And calls a court of those below, 
The life of each intent to learn 

And what the cause that wrought them woe. 
Next comes their portion in the gloom 
Who guiltless sent themselves to doom, 
And all for loathing of the day 
In madness threw their lives away : 
How gladly now in upper air 
Contempt and beggary would they bear, 

And labor's sorest pain ! 
Fate bars the way : around their keep 
The slow unlovely waters creep 

And bind with ninefold chain. 

Another class were there whom love had slain. Virgil, of 
course, does not " slip the occasion " — indeed it was prob- 
ably an occasion expressly created by the poet — to bring 



Virgil. 293 

about a dramatic encounter between /Eneas and Dido. The 
total effect commends Virgil's art ; for the reader is gratefully 
relieved in his feeling as to both the two personages con- 
cerned: 

'Mid these among the branching treen 

Sad Dido moved, the Tyrian queen, 

Her death-wound ghastly yet and green. 

Soon as ./Eneas caught the view 

And through the mist her semblance knew, 

Like one who spies or thinks he spies 

Through flickering clouds the new moon rise, 

The tear-drop from his eyelids broke, 

And thus in tenderest tones he spoke : 

"Ah Dido ! rightly then I read 

The news that told me you were dead, 

Slain by your own rash hand ! 
Myself the cause of your despair ! 
Now by the blessed stars I swear. 
By heaven, by all that dead men keep 
In reverence here 'mid darkness deep, 
Against my will, ill-fated fair, 

I parted from your land. 
The gods, at whose command to-day 
Through these dim shades I take my way, 
Thread the waste realm of sunless blight, 
And penetrate abysmal night, 
They drove me forth : nor could I know 
My flight would woi-k such cruel woe : 
Stay, stay your step awhile, nor fly 
So quickly from ^Eneas' eye. 
Whom would you shun ? this brief space o'er, 
Fate suffers us to meet no more." 
Thus while the briny tears run down, 
The hero strives to calm her frown, 

Still pleading 'gainst disdain : 
She on the ground averted kept 
Hard eyes that neither smiled nor wept, 
Nor bated more of her stern mood 
Than if a monument she stood 

Of firm Marpesian grain. 
At length she tears her from the place 
And hies her, still with sullen face, 

Into the embowering grove, 
Where her first lord, Sychseus, shares 
In tender interchange of cares 

And gives her love for love ; 
yEneas tracks her as she flies, 
With bleeding heart and tearful eyes. 



294 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

As soon as ^Eneas could stanch his flowing heart and eyes, 
he with his guide advanced to the quarters of the warrior 
dead. Here Trojan ghosts recognized him : 

They cluster round their ancient friend ; 

No single view contents their eye : 
They linger and his steps attend, 

And ask him how he came, and why. 

Upon the Grecian slain a quite different effect is produced 
by the sight of ^Eneas : 

Some huddle in promiscuous rout 

As erst at Troy they sought the fleet ; 

Some feebly raise the battle-shout ; 

Their straining throats the thin tones flout 
Unformed and incomplete. 

The Sibyl checks a colloquy between ^Eneas and De-iph'o- 
bus with reminder that # the time was passing. Deiphobus 
flees, and ^Eneas now beholds a gloomy prison-house of pain. 
Virgil describes and, through the Sibyl, relates : 

Hark ! from within there issue groans 

The cracking of the thong, 
The clank of iron o'er the stones 

Dragged heavily along. 
TEneas halted, and drank in 
With startled car the fiendish din : 
" What forms of crime are these? " he cries, 

" What shapes of penal woe? 
What piteous wails assault the shies? 

O maid ! I fain would know." 
*' Brave chief of Troy," returned the seer, 
"No soul from guilt's pollution clear 

May yon foul threshold tread : 
But me when royal Hecate made 
Controller of the Avernian shade, 
The realms of torture she displayed, 

And through their horrors led. 
Stern monaixh of these dark domains, 
The Gnosian Rhadamanthus reigns : 
He hears and judges each deceit, 

And makes the soul those crimes declare 
Which, glorying in the empty cheat, 

It veiled from sight in upper air. 
Swift on the guilty, scourge in hand, 

Leaps fell Tisiphone, and shakes 

Full in their face her loathly snakes, 
And calls her sister band. 



Virgil. 295 



Then, not till then, the hinges grate, 

And slowly opes the infernal gate, 

See you who sits that gate to guard ? 

What presence there keeps watch and ward? 

"Within, the Hydra's direr shape 

Sits with her fifty throats agape. 

Then Tartarus with sheer descent 

Dips 'neath the ghost-world twice as deep 
As towers above earth's continent 

The height of heaven's Olympian steep. 
'Tis there the eldest born of earth, 
The children of Titanic birth, 
Hurled headlong by the lightning's blast, 
Deep in the lowest gulf are cast. 
Aloeus' sons there met my eyes, 
Twin monsters of enormous size, 
Who stormed the gate of heaven, and strove 
From his high seat to pull down Jove. 
Salmoneus too I saw in chains, 
The victim of relentless pains, 
While Jove's awn flame he tries to mock 
And emulate the thunder-shock. 
By four fleet coursers chariot-borne 
And scattering brands in impious scorn 

Through Elis' streets he rode, 
All Greece assisting at the show, 
And claimed of fellow-men below 

The honors of a god : 
Fond fool ! to think that thunderous crash 
And heaven's inimitable flash 
Man's puny craft could counterfeit 
With rattling brass and horsehoof's beat. 
Lo ! from the sky the Almighty Sire 
The levin-bolt's authentic fire 

'Mid thickest darkness sped 
(No volley his of pine-wood smoke) 
And with the inevitable stroke 

Dispatched him to the dead. 
There too is Tityos the accurst, 
By earth's all-fostering bosom nurst ; 
O'er acres nine from end to end 
His vast unmeasured limbs extend : 
A vulture on his liver preys : 
The liver fails not nor decays : 
Still o'er that flesh, which breeds new pangs, 
With crooked beak the torturer hangs, 
Explores its depth with bloody fangs, 

And searches for her food ; 
Still haunts the cavern of his breast, 
Nor lets the filaments have rest, 

To endless pain renewed. 



296 



Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



Why should I name the Lapith race, 

Pirithous and Ixion base? 

A frowning rock their heads o'ertops, 

Which ever nods and almost drops : 

Couches where golden pillars shine 

Invite them freely to recline, 

And banquets smile before their eyne 

With kingly splendor proud : 
When lo ! fell malice in her mien, 
Beside them lies the Furies' queen : 
From the rich fare she bars their hand, 
Thrusts in their face her sulphurous brand, 

And thunders hoarse and loud. 
Here those who wronged a brother's love, 

Assailed a sire's grey hair, 
Or for a trustful client wove 

A treachery and a snare, 
Who wont on hoarded wealth to brood, 
In sullen selfish solitude, 
Nor call their friends to share the good 

(The most in number they) 
With those whom vengeance robbed of life 
For guilty love of other's wife, 
And those who drew the unnatural sword, 
Or broke the bond 'twixt slave and lord, 

Await the reckoning-day. 




SISYPHUS, IXION, TANTALUS. 



Ask not their doom, nor seek to know 
What depth receives them there below. 
Some roll huge rocks up rising ground, 
Or hang, to whirling wheels fast bound 



Virgil. 297 

There in the bottom of the pit 
Sits Theseus, and will ever sit : 
And Phlegyas warns the ghostly crowd, 
Proclaiming through the shades aloud, 
" Behold, and learn to practice right, 
Nor do the blessed gods despite." 
This to a tyrant master sold 
His native land for cursed gold, 

Made laws for lucre and unmade: 
That dared his daughter's bed to climb : 
All, all essayed some monstrous crime, 

And perfected the crime essayed. 
No — had I e'en a hundred tongues, 
A hundred mouths, and iron lungs, 
Those types of guilt I could not show, 
Nor tell the forms of penal woe. 

The Sibyl, ending thus, once more hastens ^Eneas, and 
they go on to the dwelling-place of the happy dead. At the 
entrance, ^Eneas deposits his golden bough. Virgil describes 
Elysium and its inhabitants : 

Green spaces, folded in with trees, 
A paradise of pleasances. 
Around the champaign mantles bright 
The fullness of purpureal light ; 
Another sun and stars they know, 
That shine like ours, but shine below. 
There some disport their manly frames 
In wrestling and palsestral games, 
Strive on the grassy sward, or stand 
Contending on the yellow sand : 
Some ply the dance with eager feet 
And chant responsive to its beat. 
The priest of Thrace in loose attire 
Makes music on his seven-stringed lyre ; 
The sweet notes 'neath his fingers trill, 
Or tremble 'neath his ivory quill. 
Here dwell the chiefs from Teucer sprung, 
Brave heroes, born when earth was young, 
Ilus, Assaracus, and he 
Who gave his name to Dardany. 
Marveling, ^Eneas sees from far 
The ghostly arms, the shadowy car. 
Their spears are planted in the mead : 
Free o'er the plain their horses feed : 
Whate'er the living found of charms 
In chariot and refulgent arms, 
13* 



298 Preparatory Lathi Course in English. 

Whate'er their care to tend and groom 
Their glossy steeds, outlives the tomb. 
Others along the sward he sees 
Reclined, and feasting at their ease 

With chanted Paeans, blessed souls, 
Amid a fragrant bay-tree grove, 
Whence rising in the world above 
Eridanus 'twixt bowering trees 

His breadth of water rolls. 

Here sees he the illustrious dead 
Who fighting for their country bled ; 
Priests, who while earthly life remained 
Preserved that life unsoiled, unstained ; 
Blest bards, transparent souls and clear, 
Whose song was worthy Phoebus' ear ; 
Inventors, who by arts refined 
The common life of human kind, 
With all who grateful memory won 
By services to others done : 
A goodly brotherhood, bedight 
With coronals of virgin white. 
There as they stream along the plain 
The Sibyl thus accosts the train, 
Musaeus o'er the rest, for he 
Stands midmost in that company, 
His stately head and shoulders tall 
O'ertopping and admired of all : 
" Say, happy souls, and thou, blest seer, 

In what retreat Anchises bides : 
To look on him we journey here, 

Across the dread Avernian tides." 
And answer to her quest in brief 
Thus made the venerable chief: 
" No several home has each assigned; 
We dwell where forest pathways wind, 
Haunt velvet banks 'neath shady treen, 
And meads with rivulets fresh and green ; 
But climb with me this ridgy hill, 
Yon path shall take you where you will." 
He said, and led the way, and showed 

The fields of dazzling light : 
They gladly choose the downward road, 

And issue from the height. 

They find Anchises busy at an employment which must 
have afforded that highly patriotic old gentleman much 
pleasure. He was surveying the yet unborn generations of 
his own destined progeny. For this Elysium seems to have 



Virgil. 299 

been not only the home of the beatified dead, but a waiting- 
place, an ante-room, for those that were to live. Anchises 
descries ^Eneas and salutes him. The son striving to em- 
brace the sire is cheated with an intangible phantom in his 
grasp. But a new sight diverts his mind : 

Deep woodlands, where the evening gale 

Goes whispering through the trees, 
And Lethe river, which flows by 
Those dwellings of tranquillity. 
Nations and tribes, in countless ranks, 
Were crowding to its verdant banks : 
As bees afield in summer clear 
Beset the flowerets far and near 
And round the fair white lilies pour : 
The deep hum sounds the champaign o'er. 
iEneas, startled at the scene, 
Asks wondering what the noise may mean, 
What river this, or what the throng 
That crowds so thick its banks along. 

Anchises replying describes a kind of purgatory in which 
souls linger, to become pure through pain, until, after the lapse 
of a millennium, summoned they come to the banks of Lethe 
and thence drinking forget the past and are born anew into 
the world of men. Readers will hardly need to be told that 
Virgil has thus prepared his way for going over, in a novel 
and striking manner, the whole range of Roman history. It 
will be prophecy at excellent advantage, for it will be proph- 
ecy after the fact. There will be in it magnificent opportu- 
nity offered for compliment to the imperial house of Rome. 
Such compliment Virgil prepares, compliment more elaborate 
and more lofty than perhaps ever before or since in the annals 
of literature was laid by poet at the feet of his prince. An- 
chises leads his son ^Eneas with the Sibyl to a " specular 
mount," 

whence the eye 
Might form and countenance descry, 
As each one passed along. 

Anchises then takes up the office of herald or usher, and 
announces the name and quality of the illustrious descend- 



300 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

ants who should prolong and decorate the Trojan line. 
We quote : 

" Now listen what the future fame 
Shall follow the Dardanian name, 

What glorious spirits wait 
Our progeny to furnish forth : 
My tongue shall name each soul of worth, 

And show you of your fate. 
See you yon gallant youth advance 
Leaning upon a headless lance? 
He next in upper air holds place, 
First offspring of the Italian race 
Commixed with ours, your latest child 
By Alban name of Silvius styled, 
Whom to your eye Lavinia fair 
In silvan solitude shall bear, 
Xing, sire of kings, by whom comes down 
Through Trojan hands the Alban crown. 
Nearest to him see Procas shine, 
The glory of Dardania's line, 
And Numitor and Capys too, 
And one that draws his name from you, 
Silvius ./Eneas, mighty he 
Alike in arms and piety, 
Should Fate's high pleasure e'er command 
The Alban scepter to his land. 
Look how they bloom in youth's fresh flower ! 
What promise theirs of martial power ! 
Mark you the civic wreath they wear, 
The oaken garland in their hair? 
These, these are they, whose hands shall crown 
The mountain heights with many a town. 
Shall Gabii and Nomentum rear, 
There plant Collatia, Cora here, 
And leave to after years their stamp 
On Bola and on Inuus' camp : 
Names that shall then be far renowned, 
Now nameless spots of unknown ground. 
There to his grandsire's fortune clings 

Young Romulus of Mars' true breed ; 
From Ilia's womb the warrior springs, 

Assaracus' authentic seed. 
See on his helm the double crest, 
The token by his sire impressed, 
That marks him out betimes to share 
The heritage of upper air. 
Lo ! by his fiat called to birth 

Imperial Rome shall rise, 
Extend her reign to utmost earth, 

Her genius to the skies, 



Virgil. 301 

And with a wall of girdling stone 
Embrace seven hills herself alone — 
Blest in an offspring wise and strong : 
So through great cities rides along 

The mighty Mother, crowned with towers, 
Around her knees a numerous line, 
A hundred grandsons, all divine, 

All tenants of Olympian bowers. 

Turn hither now your ranging eye : 
Behold a glorious family, 

Your sons and sons of Rome : 
Lo ! Caesar there and all his seed, 
lulus' progeny, decreed 

To pass 'neath heaven's high dome. 
This, this is he, so oft the theme 
Of your prophetic fancy's dream, 

Augustus Caesar, Jove's own strain ; 
Restorer of the age of gold 
In lands where Saturn ruled of old : 
O'er Ind and Garamant extreme 

Shall stretch his boundless reign. 
Look to that land which lies afar 
Beyond the path of sun or star, 
Where Atlas on his shoulder rears 
The burden of the incumbent spheres. 
Egypt e'en now and Caspia hear 
The muttered voice of many a seer, 
And Nile's seven mouths, disturbed with fear, 

Their coming conqueror know : 
Alcides in his savage chase 
Ne'er traveled o'er so wide a space, 
What though the brass-hoofed deer he killed, 
And Erymanthus' forest stilled, 
And Lerna's depth with terror thrilled 
At twanging of his bow : 
Nor stretched his conquering march so far, 
Who drove his ivy-harnessed car 
From Nysa's lofty height, and broke 
The tiger's spirit 'neath his yoke. 
And shrink we in this glorious hour 
From bidding worth assert her power, 
Or can our craven hearts recoil 
From settling on Ausonian soil ? 

But who is he at distance seen 
With priestly garb and olive green ? 
That reverend beard, that hoary hair 
The royal sage of Rome declare, 
Who first shall round the city draw 
The limitary lines of law, 



302 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Called forth from Cures' petty town 
To bear the burden of a crown. 
Then he whose voice shall break the rest 
That lulled to sleep a nation's breas-t, 
And sound in languid ears the cry 
Of Tullus and of victory. 

Say, shall I show you face to face 
The monarchs of Tarquinian race, 
And vengeful Brutus, proud to wring 
The people's fasces from a king ? 
He first in consul's pomp shall lift 
The axe and rods, the freeman's gift, 
And call his own rebellious seed 
For menaced liberty to bleed. 
Unhappy father ! howso'e'er 

The deed be judged by after days, 
His country's love shall all o'erbear, 

And unextinguished thirst of praise. 
There move the Decii, Drusus here, 
Torquatus, too, with axe severe, 
And great Camillus : mark him show 
Rome's standards rescued from the foe ! 
But those who side by side you see 

In equal armor bright, 
Now twined in bonds of amity 

While yet they dwell in night, 
Alas ! how terrible their strife, 
If e'er they win their way to life, 

How fierce the shock of war, 
This kinsman rushing to the fight 
From castellated Alpine height, 
That leading his embattled might 

From farthest morning star ! 
Nay, children, nay, your hate unlearn, 
Nor 'gainst your country's vitals turn 

The valor of her sons : 
And thou, do thou the first refrain ; 
Cast down thy weapons on the plain, 
Thou, born of Jove's Olympian strain, 

In whom my lifeblood runs ! 

One, victor in Corinthian war, 
Up Capitol shall drive his car, 

Proud of Achoeans slain : 
And one Mycenoe shall o'erthrow, 
The city of the Atridan foe, 
And e'en ^Eacides destroy, 
Achilles' long-descended boy, 
In vengeance for his sires of Troy, 

And Pallas' plundered fane. 



Virgil. 303 



Who mighty Cato, Cossus, who 

Would keep your names concealed ? 
The Gracchi, and the Scipios two, 

The levins of the field, 
Serranus o'er his furrow bowed, 
Or thee, Fabricius, poor yet proud ? 
Ye Fabii, must your actions done 
The speed of panting praise outrun? 
Our greatest thou, whose wise delay 
Restores the fortune of the day. 
Others, I ween, with happier grace 
From bronze or stone shall call the face, 
Plead doubtful causes, map the skies, 
And tell when planets set or rise : 
But ye, my Romans, still control 

The nations far and wide, 
Be this your genius — to impose 
The rule of peace on vanquished foes, 
Show pity to the humbled soul, 

And crush the sons of pride." 



Virgil, they say, read his sixth book aloud to Augustus. 
At the reading, Augustus's sister, Octavia, was present. This 
sister had then just lost a son, Marcellus, dead at twenty 
years of age. With exquisite art of adulation, perhaps too 
of sincerely sympathetic consolation, Virgil, as we are just 
about to show our readers, introduced at this point a noble 
and delicate tribute to young Marcellus. The story is that 
the mother fainted with emotion when she heard it. She 
rallied, to make the fortunate poet glad with a great gift of 
money. We proceed with the resumed prophetic strain of 
Anchises, allusive now to Marcellus : 

He ceased ; and ere their awe was o'er, 
Took up his prophecy oace more : 
" Lo, great Marcellus ! see him tower. 
With kingly spoils, in conquering power, 

The warrior host above ! 
He in a day of dire debate 
Shall stablish firm the reeling state, 
The Carthaginian bands o'erride, 
Break down the Gaul's insurgent pride, 
And the third trophy dedicate 

To Rome's Feretrian Jove." 



304 Preparatory Lathi Course in English. 



Then spoke ^Eneas, who beheld 

Beside the warrior pace 
A youth, full-armed, by none excelled 

In beauty's manly grace, 
But on his brow was naught of mirth, 
And his fixed eyes were dropped on earth ; 
"Who, father, he, who thus attends 

Upon that chief divine ? 
His son, or other who descends 

From his illustrious line ? 
What whispers in the encircling crowd ? 
The portance of his steps how proud ? 
But gloomy night, as of the dead, 
Flaps her sad pinions o'er his head." 
The sire replies, while down his cheek 

The tear-drops roll apace : 
'• Ah son ! compel me not to speak 

The sorrows of our race ! 
That youth the Fates but just display 
To earth, nor let him him longer stay : 
With gifts like these for aye to hold, 
Rome's heart had e'en been overbold. 
Ah ! what a groan from Mars's plain 

Shall o'er the city sound ! 
How wilt thou gaze on that long train, 
Old Tiber, rolling to the main 

Beside his new-raised mound ! 
No youth of Ilium's seed inspires 
With hope as fair his Latian sires : 
Nor Rome shall dandle on her knee 
A nursling so adored as he. 
O piety ! O ancient faith ! 
O hand untamed in battle scathe ! 
No foe had lived before his sword, 

Stemmed he on foot the war's red tide 
Or with relentless rowel gored 

His foaming charger's side. 
Dear child of pity ! shouldst thou burst 
The dungeon-bars of Fate accurst, 

Our own Marcellus thou ! 
Bring lilies here, in handfuls bring : 
Their lustrous blooms I fain would fling: 
Such honor to a grandson's shade 
By grandsire hands may well be paid : 

Yet O ! it 'vails not now ! " 



Mid such discourse, at will they range 
The mist-clad region, dim and strange. 
So when the sire the son had led 
Through all the ranks of happy dead, 



Virgil. 305 

And stirred his spirit into flame 
At thought of centuries of fame, 
With prophet power he next relates 
The war that in the future waits, 
Italia's fated realm describes, 
Latinus' town, Laurentum's tribes, 
And tells him how to face or fly 
Each cloud that darkens o'er his sky. — 
Sleep gives his name to portals twain : 

One all of horn, they say, 
Through which authentic specters gain 

Quick exit into day, 
And one which bright with ivory gleams, 
Whence Pluto sends delusive dreams. 
Conversing still the sire attends 

The travelers on their road, 
And through the ivory portal sends 

From forth the unseen abode. 
The chief betakes him to the fleet, 
Well pleased again his crew to meet : 
Then for Caieta's port sets sail, 

Straight coasting by the strand : 
The anchors from the prow they hale, 

The sterns are turned to land. 

Let readers remark with what fine artistic self-restraint 
Virgil at the close dimisses the arduous subject of the sixth 
book. No effort at unnaturally sustaining the tension be- 
yond its just end. The stream of his verse has writhed in 
long subterranean torture, but it issues placidly in light and 
peace, with calm unconscious resumption of the usual flow 
of the narrative. The basis of the whole episode is Homeric, 
but the majestic imperial sweep of execution is purely, in- 
imitably, Virgilian. 

Students of Milton will not fail to note, in that poet's review 
of the history of the world, given in prophetic recital to Adam 
from the lips of Raphael, the " affable archangel," a likeness 
in idea to Virgil's sketch of Roman story put into the mouth 
of Anchises in Elysium. On the whole, there is no nobler 
poetry in Virgil, no poetry at the same time more character- 
istic of the poet at his highest and best, and more character- 
istic of great Rome herself at the summit of her victorious 
pride, than is what we have thus, from the sixth book of 



306 Preparatory Lati?i Course i?i Eiiglish. 

the /Eneid, spread out in large quotation before our readers. 
If your heart does not swell, and your imagination stir her 
wings, at this touch from the wand of the enchanter, then 
you may conclude that his power is powerless for you. 

We have now finished that part of the ^Eneid which is 
usually read by the student in preparation for college. What 
remains of the poem we may fairly despatch, as necessarily 
we must, within very brief space. ^neas, thrifty soul, secures 
for himself a royal matrimonial alliance, which, however, in- 
volves him in war with a rival, Turnus by name. This Tur- 
nus is the foil to ^Eneas. The foil is almost too much for 
the hero. It is decidedly by a very narrow chance, if the 
reader's sympathies do not go over from cold-blooded 
./Eneas to the side of Turnus foredoomed to be slain. After 
many oscillations of fortune in war, the narration of which 
is mixed and prolonged with many episodes and many dia- 
logues, it is finally determined that Turnus and /Eneas shall 
decide the strife by single combat. This combat, with its 
diversified incidents, fills up the measure of the twelfth and 
last book of the poem. It is the Iliad over again, but the 
Iliad fairly made into the ^Eneid, by a genius in Virgil as 
clearly his own as the genius of Homer was his. We quote 
the closing lines. Turnus is overthrown, after heroic struggle 
against a foregone and foreshown conclusion of the strife. 
He confesses defeat, resigns his betrothed to /Eneas, but begs 
to be sent back, living or dead, to his father. Now Virgil : 

Rolling his eyes, /Eneas stood, 

And checked his sword, athirst for blood. 

Now faltering more and more he felt 

The human heart within him melt, 

When round the shoulder wreathed in pride 

The belt of Pallas he espied, 

And sudden flashed upon his view 

Those golden studs so well he knew, 

Which Turnus from the stripling tore 

When breathless on the field he lay, 
And on his breast in triumph wore, 

Memorial of the bloody day. 



Virgil. 307 

Soon as his eyes had gazed their fill 

On that sad monument of ill, 

Live fury kindling every vein, 

He cries with terrible disdain : 

" What ! in my friend's dear spoils arrayed 

To me for mercy sue ? 
'Tis Pallas, Pallas guides the blade : 
From your cursed blood his injured shade 

Thus takes the atonement due." 
Thus as he spake, his sword he drave 

With fierce and fiery blow 
Through the broad breast before him spread : 
The stalwart limbs grow cold and dead : 
One groan the indignant spirit gave, 

Then sought the shades below. 

We dismiss our task with Virgil by presenting to our read- 
ers the elaborate parallel that Pope, in the preface to his 
translation of the Iliad, draws between the Greek poet and 
the Roman : 

"The beauty of his [Homer's] numbers is allowed by the 
critics to be copied but faintly by Virgil himself, though 
they are so just as to ascribe it to the nature of the Latin 
tongue. Indeed, the Greek has some advantages, both from 
the natural sound of its words, and the turn and cadence of 
its verse, which agree with the genius of no other language. 
Virgil was very sensible of this, and used the utmost dil- 
igence in working up a more intractable language to what- 
soever graces it was capable of; and in particular never 
failed to bring the sound of his line to a beautiful agree- 
ment with its sense. [A celebrated instance of this occurs 
in the eighth book, line 596 : 

Quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum, 

to represent the measured numerous tread of galloping horses.] 
If the Grecian poet has not been so frequently celebrated on 
this account as the Roman, the only reason is, that fewer crit- 
ics have understood one language than the other. Dionysius 
of Halicarnassus has pointed out many of our author's 
beauties in this kind, in his treatise of the ' Composition of 



308 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Words.' It suffices at present to observe of his numbers, 
that they flow with so much ease as to make one imagine 
Homer had no other care than to transcribe as fast as the 
Muses dictated ; and at the same time with so much force 
and aspiring vigor that they awaken and raise us like the 
sound of a trumpet. They roll along as a plentiful river, 
always in motion, and always full ; while we are borne away 
by a tide of verse, the most rapid and yet the most smooth 
imaginable. 

" Thus, on whatever side we contemplate Homer, what 
principally strikes us is his invention. It is that which 
forms the character of each part of his work ; and accord- 
ingly we find it to have made his fable more extensive 
and copious than any other, his manners more lively and 
strongly marked, his speeches more affecting and trans- 
ported, his sentiments more warm and sublime, his im- 
ages and descriptions more full and animated, his expres- 
sion more raised and daring, and his numbers more rapid 
and various. I hope, in what has been said of Virgil, with 
regard to any of these heads, I have in no way derogated 
from his character. Nothing is more absurd and endless 
than the common method of comparing eminent writers by 
an opposition of particular passages in them, and forming a 
judgment from thence of their merit upon the whole. We 
ought to have a certain knowledge of the principal character 
and distinguishing excellence of each : it is in that we are to 
consider him, and in proportion to his degree in that we are 
to admire him. No author or man ever excelled all the 
world in more than one faculty : and as Homer has done 
this in invention, Virgil has in judgment; not that we are to 
think Homer wanted judgment, because Virgil has it in a 
more eminent degree, or that Virgil wanted invention, be- 
cause Homer possessed a larger share of it; each of these 
great authors had more of both than perhaps any man be- 
sides, and are only said to have less in comparison with one 



Virgil, 309 



another. Homer was the greater genius, Virgil the better 
artist. In one we most admire the man, in the other the 
work ; Homer hurries and transports us with a commanding 
impetuosity, Virgil leads us with an attractive majesty; 
Homer scatters with a generous profusion, Virgil bestows 
with a careful magnificence ; Homer, like the Nile, pours 
out his riches with a boundless overflow ; Virgil, like a river 
in its banks, with a gentle and constant stream. When we 
behold their battles, methinks the two poets resemble the 
heroes they celebrate. Homer, boundless and irresistible as 
Achilles, bears all before him, and shines more and more as 
the tumult increases ; Virgil, calmly daring, like ^Eneas, ap- 
pears undisturbed in the midst of the action, disposes all 
about him, and conquers with tranquillity. And when we 
look upon their machines, Homer seems like his own Jupiter 
in his terrors, shaking Olympus, scattering the lightnings, 
and firing the heavens ; Virgil, like the same power in his 
benevolence, counseling with the gods, laying plans for em- 
pires, and regularly ordering his whole creation." 



Those who have read the present volume, together with 
its fellow preceding, are prepared to enter, w r ith the two 
books following in completion of the series, upon their col- 
lege course in Greek and Latin. We shall hope to graduate 
our readers in numbers increasing rather than diminishing 
to the end of their classical course. 



3io Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



APPENDIX. 



Readers of this book who may desire to make some- 
what serious work of the perusal, will appreciate a scheme 
of review and self-testing here submitted. We first assemble, 
in alphabetical order, the various proper names having a 
certain degree of importance that occur in the foregoing 
pages, with space enough adjacent left blank to receive the 
entry of such facts concerning the persons or places named 
as are most material. 

We begin with the principal names, that is, the names of 
the Latin authors whose writings are reproduced, and follow 
with the names of persons incidentally or subordinately 
mentioned. Then comes a list of geographical and national 
names. 

We reprint here the few prefatory words furnished by 
Rev. John H. Vincent, D.D., for a similar scheme, his own 
device, in the Preparatory Greek Course — taking pleasure, 
at the same time, in crediting to that enlightened and 
public-spirited popular instructor, the origination of the idea 
of this series of volumes : 

The Student's Memoranda. 

The reader of this volume may profitably fill the blanks 
on the following pages. 

The labor required in this is very slight, but well performed 
will be of value, as it incites to the exercise of judgment, the 



Appendix. 311 



discipline of memory, and the training in the art of concise 
and comprehensive statement. Every effort to recall and to 
express one's knowledge gives a firmer hold upon that knowl- 
edge, and renders it of greater practical value. He who 
does a little work well, will know how to undertake some- 
thing larger, and from this experience will come continued 
and cumulative success. The reader may become the stu- 
dent, and the student, after a while, the scholar. 

The exercises here provided are for beginners — whether 
they be old or young. They are not tasks assigned, but op- 
portunities offered. The work may be done at any time, 
and in any place, and after any method. Only let the work 
be done. 

The student having mastered the several subjects with 
sufficient fullness to be able to write out his answers, should 
do so with care and neatness, that he may never have reason 
to be ashamed of the portion of the book which he has him- 
self written. 

Record. — Began reading this book , 188. . 

Finished it , 1 88 . . 

Name 

Residence 

A Statement— -The object of this book : 



312 Preparatory Latin Course hi English. 

An Outline. — The contents of the book stated in few words : 



A Selection. — In what incidents and passages contained in 
the book have I been most interested ? (Indicate here by- 
pages. On the pages mark the selections.) 



Biographical. — Give in condensed form the principal facts 
and characteristics * of the following persons : 
Caesar: 



Cicero : 



* Name. .. .Family ... .Time and Place of Birth. .. .Prin. Deeds.... 
Prin. Writings. . . .Characteristics. . » .Time and Place of Death. . . .Esti- 
mate of Influence. . . . 



Ovid : 



Sallust 



Virgil : 



Acco : 
Addison : 
Adherbal : 
^Eneas : 
^Eschines 
Ambiorix : 
14 



Appendix. 313 



314 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Angelico : 

Antony : 

Ascanius : 

Augustus: 

Ariovistus: 

Arnold : 

Ascham : 

Baculus : 

Blackie : 

Bocchus: 

Boileau : 



Browning, Mrs. 



Brutus : 
Burke : 
Byron : 



Appendix. 315 



Butcher & Lans 
Carlyle : 
Cassivelaunus : 
Catiline : 
Cato: 
Cavour : 
Chapman : 
Charon : 
Choate : 
Cineas: 
Coleridge: 
Collins : 
Cornelia : 
Cranch : 
Crassus : 



316 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Creighton : 

Creusa : 
Croly : 
Cruttwell : 
Curtius : 
Dumnorix : 
De Quincey : 
Dido: 
Divitiacus; 
Dolabella : 
Dryden : 



Egeria : 



Ennius : 
Epicurus : 
Euripides : 



Appendix. 317 



Fabius : 

Frederic the Great 
Froude : 
Gibbon : 
Goethe : 
Gracchus : 
Hamilcar : 
Hannibal : 
Havelock : 
Hawthorne : 
Hesiod : 
Hiempsal : 
Hirtius : 
Homer : 
Horace : 



318 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 



Hortensius: 

Isaiah : 

lulus: 

Johnson : 

Jugurtha: 

Juvenal : 

Labienus : 

Leigh ton : 

Liddell : 

Livius Andronicui 

Livy : 

Long: 

Longinus: 

Long, John D. : 

Louis XIV.: 



Appendix, 3 T 9 



Lowell : 
Lucilius : 
Lucretius : 
Lucullus: 
Macaulay : 
Maecenas : 
Marcellus : 
Marius : 
Memmius: 
Metellus : 
Merivale : 
Micipsa : 
Milton : 
Mommsen : 
Montesquieu 



320 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Morris : 

Mithridates : 

Motley : 

Naevius : 

Napoleon : 

Nepos Cornelius : 

Nero : 

Niobe : 

Octavia: 

Orgetorix : 

Palinurus : 

Phaer : 

Phaeton : 

Philip of Macedon : 

Plautus : 



Appendix. 321 

Pliny : 

Plutarch : 

Pollio : 

Pompey : 

Pope : 

Pulfio : 

Pyrrhus : 
Quintilian : 
Regulus : 

Romulus and Remus : 
Rutilius : 
Saxe : 
Scaurus : 
Scipio : 
Simcox : 
14* 



322 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Sellar : 

Seneca: 
Shakespeare : 
Sinon : 
Sixtus : 
Spenser : 
Suetonius : 
Sumner : 
Sylla : 

Taylor, Bayard : 
Tennyson : 
Terence : 
Theocritus : 
Thomson : 
Thucydides : 



Appendix. 323 



Tiberius : 

Titurius : 

Titus: 

Trollope : 

Turnus : 

Varro : 

Vercingetorix : 

Victor Immanuel : 

Volux : 

Webster : 

Wordsworth : 

Xenophon : 

Students will find highly useful an atlas of Ancient or 
Classical Geography. Such an atlas elegantly executed is 
offered by Ginn, Heath, & Co., at reasonable rates. 



Geographical and National : * 
.ZEduans : 



* Location. . . .Size. . . .Characteristics. . . .Influence. 



324 Preparatory Latin Course in English.. 



Allobroges : 
Aquitanians : 
Ardennes : 
Balearic : 
Belgians : 
Bellovaci : 
Britain : 
Cannae : 
Capua : 
Carthage : 
Chester : 
Cimbrians : 
Crete : 
Delos : 
Dorchester : 



Appendix. 



3^5 



Eburones : 

Epirus : 

Getulians : 

Germany : 

Goths : 

Helvetians 

Huns : 

Italy : 

Latium : 

Lingones : 

Luca: 

Lutetia Parisioram 

Macedonia : 

Massilia : 

Mauritania: 



326 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

Nervii : 

Numidia: 

Parthenope : 

Pontus : 

Remi : 

Rome : 

Sequani : 

Sicily : 

Suessiones: 

Suevi : 

Syria : 

Tarentum : 

Teutons : 

Thrace : 

Tiber : 



Appendix. 327 



Treviri : 

Utica: 

Veneti : 

Roman History. 
From Dr. Vincent's interesting and helpful little primer of 
Roman History, belonging to the series of Chautauqua 
Text-books, so-called, we take the following arrangement of 
periods and ages : 

I. The Traditional — about 500 years — from 1,000 B.C. 
to 509 B.C. And this may be again divided into two nearly 
equal periods: 

1. From the Etruscan entrance to the founding of Rome. 
(It may help the memory to associate with the founding of 
Rome by Romulus, in 753 B.C., the first Olympiad in Greece, 
776 B.C., and the taking into captivity of the ten tribes of 
Israel, 721 B.C.) 

2. From the founding of Rome to the expulsion of the last 
of its " seven kings." 

II. The Republican — about 500 years — from 509 B. C. to 
30 B. C. At the first date (509) the last king (Tarquinius 
Superbus) passed into exile. At the last date (30) the first 
emperor (Augustus Csesar) passed into power. The repub- 
lican period comprised four stages : 

1. That of class-strife in Rome. 

2. That of tribal feuds in Italy. 

3. That of foreign conquest in Europe, Asia, and Africa. 

4. That of civil wars within the republic. 

III. The Imperial — about 500 years — from 30 B. C. to 
476 A. D. — from the first emperor — Octavius (Augustus) — to 



328 Preparatory Lati?i Course in English. 

the sixty-second emperor — Romulus Augustulus. This pe- 
riod comprised five ages : 

1. The Augustan Age. 

2. The Augustan Emperors. 

3. The Age of the Twelve. 

4. The Age of the Decline. 

5. The Age of the Vandals. 

From Mr. Creighton's Primer we transfer the following 

Chronological Table. 

b. c. 

"Rome founded , 753 

The Romans drove out their Kings 509 

The Plebeians first had Tribunes 494 

The Decemvirs published the Laws at Rome 451 

The Romans took Veii from the Etruscans 396 

The Gauls took Rome 389 

The Laws of Licinius and Sextius made the Pa- 
tricians and Plebeians equal in Rome 366 

The Romans conquered the Latins 338 

The Romans, having conquered the Samnites, be- 
came the chief people in Italy 290 

The Romans drove Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, out of 

Italy 275 

First war with Carthage 264-241 

War with Hannibal » 219-202 

The Romans conquered the East 200-160 

The Romans conquered Spain 150 

Destruction of Carthage 146 

Tiberius Gracchus tried to reform the Roman State 133 

Caius Gracchus tried to reform the Roman State.. 1 23-1 21 

War with Jugurtha in Numidia 111-106 

Caius Marius drove back the Teutones and Cimbri 

from Italy 102 

The Italians forced Rome to make them Roman 

citizens 91-89 

Civil War between Sulla and Marius 88-82 

Cnaeus Pompeius overcame Rome's rebels 74-61 

Caius Julius Caesar conquered the Gauls 58-^9 

Caius Julius Caesar invaded Britain 54 



Appendix. 329 



Civil War between Pompeius and Caesar in which b. c. 
Caesar was conqueror at the Battle of Pharsalia 49-48 

Caius Julius Caesar put himself at the head of the 

Government of Rome 48-44 

Caius Julius Caesar was murdered 44 

Marcus Antonius, Caius Octavianus, and Marcus 
Lepidus gained the chief power in the Roman 
State 43 

Octavianus defeated Antonius at Actium, and be- 
came the chief man in Rome 31 

Octavianus, known as Augustus Caesar, governed the 
. Roman Republic as Emperor, B. C 30-14 A. D. 



From the Appendix to Cruttwell's " History of Roman Lit- 
erature " we make a selection of 

Questions or Subjects for Essays Suggested by the History of 
Ro7?ian Literature. 

1. Trace the influence of conquest on Roman literature. 

2. Examine. Niebuhr's hypothesis of an old Roman epos. 

3. Trace the causes of the special devotion to poetry during 

the Augustan Age. 

4. State succinctly the debt of Roman thought, in all its 

branches, to Greece. 

5. Criticise Mommsen's remark, that the drama is, after all, 

the form of literature for which the Romans were best 
adapted. 

6. In what sense is it true that the intellectual progress of 

a nation is measured by its prose writers ? 

7. " Latin literature lacks originality." How far is this criti- 

cism sound? 

8. It has been remarked, that while every great Roman au- 

thor expresses a hope of literary immortality, few, if any, 
of the great Greek authors mention it. How far is this 
difference suggestive of their respective national charac- 
ters, and of radically distinct conceptions of art ? 



330 Preparatory Latin Course in English. 

9. Examine the traces of a satiric tendency in Roman liter- 

ature, independent of professed satire. 

10. " O dimidiate Menander" By whom said? Of whom 
said ? Criticise. 

11. "Roman history ended where it had begun, in biogra- 

phy." (Merivale.) Account for the predominance of 
biography in Latin literature. 

12. In what sense can Ennius rightly be called the father of 

Latin literature ? 

13. Compare the Homeric characters as they appear in Virgil 
with their originals in the Iliad and Odyssey, and with 
the same as treated by the Greek tragedians. 

14. Contrast Latin with Greek (illustrating by any analogies 

that may occur to you in modern languages) as regards 
facility of composition. Did Latin vary in this respect 
at different periods ? 

15. What are the main differences in Latin between the 

language and constructions of poetry and those of 
prose ? 

16. Which of the great periods of Greek literature had the 

most direct or lasting influence upon that of Rome? 

17. What influence did the study of Virgil exercise (1) on 

later Latin literature; (2) on the Middle Ages; (3) on 
tne poetry of the eighteenth century? 

18. Give a succinct analysis of any speech of Cicero with 
which you are familiar, and show the principles involved 
in its construction. 

19. The influence of patronage on literature. Consider 

chiefly with reference to Rome, but illustrate from other 
literatures. 

20. Prove the assertion that jurisprudence was the only form 

of intellectual activity that Rome from first to last 
worked out in a thoroughly national manner. 

21. Which are the most important of the public, and which 

of the private, orations of Cicero? Give a short ac- 
count of one of each class, with date, place, and circum- 



Appendix. 331 



stances of delivery. How were such speeches preserved? 
Had the Romans any system of reporting? 

22. Donaldson, in his Varronia?ws, argues that the French, 
rather than the Italian, represents the more perfect form 
of the original Latin. Test this view by a comparison 
of words in both languages with the Latin forms. 

23. " Italy remained without national poetry or art." 

(Mommsen.) In what sense can this assertion be justi- 
fied? 

24. Enumerate the chief losses which Latin literature has 
sustained. 

25. Contrast briefly the life and occupations of an Athenian 
citizen in the time of Pericles and Plato, with those of a 
Roman in the age of Cicero and Augustus. 



THE END. 



PREPARATORY 

GBEEK COURSE IN ENGLISH. 

BY WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON. 

PUBLISHED BY PHILLIPS & HUNT, 

805 Proadway, New York 



our aim:. 



Thts volume belongs to a series of books, four in number, 
now in course of preparation, and soon successively to ap- 
pear. The primary design of the series is to enable persons 
prevented from accomplishing a course of school and college 
training in Latin and Greek, to enjoy an advantage as nearly 
as possible equivalent, through the medium of their native 
tongue. 

It is believed that there is among us a considerable com- 
munity of enterprising and inquisitive minds who will joy- 
fully and gratefully welcome the proffer of facilities for secur- 
ing the object thus proposed. Some of these minds will be 
found, dispersed here and there, often in quarters where it 
would be least suspected, throughout the country, among 
the young men and the young women bound by their cir- 
cumstances to the active and laborious employments of farm- 
ing, of the mechanic arts, of business, of housewifery, and 
of all the various handicrafts by which material subsistence 
is procured. But there must, moreover, be fathers and 
mothers not a few, themselves without college training, and 
even ignorant of the elements of Latin and Greek, who would 
be glad to keep, as it were, within hearing and speaking dis- 
tance of their children, while these go forward in a path of 



Preparatory Grpek Course in English. 



education in which it was forbidden to their own feet to 
tread. 

Of parents belonging to this class there will, no doubt, be 
some to whom it will be unexpected good news to hear that, 
without any insufferably tedious and impossible labor on their 
part, it can be made practicable for them to keep up a some- 
what intelligent sympathy with the young folks of their 
homes, at every stage of their progress, from the first lesson 
in Latin or Greek to the end of their college career. Two 
highly valuable practical benefits will result to parents whose 
spirit of enterprise may prompt them actually to realize this 
desirable possibility. One benefit will be the hold retained 
and strengthened thereby upon the respect of their children, 
with the accompanying continued and enhanced ability to 
influence them for their good. Another benefit will be the 
widening of their own mental horizon, and the addition in 
number and in variety to their stock of ideas. In short, 
parents, enjoying, as of course they will, the advantage over 
their children, of a maturer age and a larger experience, may 
in many cases not unwarrantably hope to reap, upon the 
whole, as rich a harvest of intellectual profit, from the com- 
paratively imperfect course of study which they pursue in 
English, as do the boys and girls, m the preparatory school 
and in college, from their more leisurely and better guided 
classical education. 

It may justly be added that intelligent and thoughtful par- 
ents may thus qualify themselves to supplement the school 
and college training of their children, in one highly important 
particular where that training is practically almost certain 
in some degree to fail. The reading of Greek and Latin 
authors in the class-room is necessarily done in such a slow 
and piecemeal fashion, that students seldom get a whole, 
comprehensive, proportionate view of the works which in 
their required course of study they translate. To many and 
many a college graduate, the perusal of Livy, of Xenophon, 



Preparatory Greek Course tn English. 



of Virgil, of Homer, of Cicero, of Plato, in a good transla- 
tion, would be not very different from forming acquaintance- 
ship with authors previously unknown. Parents who famil- 
iarize themselves with the series of volumes to which this 
volume belongs, will have it in their power to obviate, partly 
at least, a result so unfortunate, in the case of their children. 
For, with all modesty, we cherish the ambition to make many 
of our readers more effectively conversant, not certainly than 
college graduates, any of them, might be, but than college 
graduates, most of them, actually are, with the books repre- 
sented — that is, with the Greek and Latin books usually set 
down to be read into, but not through, during the two stages, 
preparatory and final, of full college education, as in America, 
at least, such education is understood. 

No blame is meant thus to be imputed to college instruct- 
ors, who, having in this country the double office to fulfill, of 
professors and of tutors, to considerable numbers at once of 
students assembled in classes, could not reasonably be ex- 
pected to do more than they do in the way of properly in- 
troducing their pupils to the treasures of Greek and Latin 
letters. We shall be truly grateful if we succeed in produc- 
ing a quaternion of books that teachers themselves in pre- 
paratory schools and in colleges will have confidence in 
recommending to the supplementary reading and use of their 
pupils. It would be pleasant to feel that while helping schol- 
ars we were also in some degree lightening the labors of 
teachers. Our books, at least, shall not be such that lax and 
lazy students can conveniently convert them into "ponies," 
as the term of school slang is, for riding luxuriously where 
they should foot it laboriously. 

If the writer may fairly reason from his own case to that of 
other college graduates, he is warranted in assuring his breth- 
ren that time spent by them in an easy and rapid review^ 
made with the aid of some such books as these will seek to 

be, of their undergraduate Latin and Greek, will prove to 

8 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



have been time not disagreeably and not unprofitably spent. 
In short, this series of volumes, if respectably well prepared, 
should find a wide and various audience. 

Readers not college-bred that are wise enough to wish for 
such facilities as it is our primary purpose here to supply, 
will also be wise enough to know, without being told, that the 
attempt would be hopeless to enable them to gain quite all 
that school and college students can gain, except upon con- 
dition of their going through substantially the same long and 
laborious process as that which those students are expected 
to accomplish. 

It now need hardly be added, that no one could regret 
such a result more than would the present writer, if an unin- 
tended and unanticipated influence of this series of books 
should be to make any person esteem a full course of liberal 
education in school and college less desirable or less impor- 
tant than that person esteemed it before. It is confidently 
hoped that, on the contrary, our undertaking will only still 
further spread and stimulate the zeal for culture which happily 
is already so vivid and so rife among us. Let everybody that 
can, go to college, and go through college. We labor here 
primarily for those who cannot. If what we do helps also 
others than these, so much the better. But that good, gladly 
welcomed, will yet be only by the way. 

The specific object of the present particular volume, the 
initial one of the series, is to put into the hands of readers 
the means of accomplishing, as far as this can be done in 
English, the same course of study in Greek as that prescribed 
for those who are preparing to enter college. We may 
style the volume the Preparatory Greek Course in 
English. 

The foregoing paragraphs are the author's own statement of his purpose 

in the above-named work. We give below a considerable collection of 

opinions, both from eminent scholars and educators, many of them special- 

4 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



ists in Greek, and from periodicals of commanding character, on the merits 
of the plan and of the execution. We deal in all frankness with those 
who may read these pages of advertisement. We do not cull out favorable 
opinions, and leave the unfavorable. We present both classes of expres- 
sion in just proportion. In cases in which praise is mingled with blame, 
we show the blame as well as the pi-aise. In no case is any attempt made 
to produce by extracts an impression more flattering to the book than 
would be produced by the full text extracted from. 

Rev. Professor A. C. KENDRICK, D.D., head of the Department of Greek 
in the University of Rochester, says : 

The plan of the book is quite unique, yet certainly adapted to the wants 
of a large and increasing class of young persons in our country. Its exe- 
cution seems to me very felicitous ; it is marked by the taste and scholar- 
ship which were to be expected from its accomplished author. I sincerely 
hope, and I can scarcely doubt, that it will prove of benefit to a wide 
circle, both as a substitute for, and as an aid to, the ordinary preparatory 
course in Greek. I trust author and publishers will find encouragement 
to complete the series. 

Professor JAMES R. EOISE, LL.D., formerly head of the Department of 
Greek in the University of Michigan, says : 

The idea of the work is original, and the execution, like every thing 
which Professor Wilkinson undertakes, is excellent. The book must 
prove, in more ways than I can enumerate, of great value to the young 
student. 

Professor LEWIS R. PACKARD, LL.D., head of the Department of 
Greek in Yale College, says : 

I think the book is well adapted to accomplish the end at which it aims. 
While I do not wholly agree with all the author's views, I think he has 
succeeded in conveying correct impressions on the subjects he treats, es- 
pecially in matters where incorrect impressions are too often current. I 
should say the book would be useful to a large class of people. 

Professor MARTIN L. D'OOGE, LL.D., head of the Depart»ent of Greek 
in the University of Michigan, says : 

The author, it will be observed, guards his statement from the erro- 
neous view that his or any similar effort is or can be an equivalent for the 
training of the mind, and the knowledge of the Latin and Greek literatures, 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



to be gained by pursuing a college course ; nor does the book anywhere 
convey any such false impression. . . . Professor Wilkinson gives the 
readers of his book a fair and interesting view of the Greek people, and of 
some of their greatest writers, and incidentally furnishes a good deal of lit- 
erary criticism and information. . . . His account of the subject-matter of 
the Anabasis is especially clear and satisfactory. The style is throughout 
bright and readable. The author evidently hopes to inspire in his readers 
sufficient interest to lead them to read and study Greek life and letters after 
they shall have finished his introductory course. 

[Professor D'Ooge makes, in closing, a valuable suggestion for improving 
the volume by the inclusion of certain additional matter.] 

Professor E. S. SHUMWAY, editor of " Latine " and head of the Depart- 
ment of Latin and Greek in the State Normal School, Potsdam, N. Y., 
says : 

I wish that I could induce every parent in the land to put that book into 
his child's hands. You have done an invaluable service to the cause of 
classical culture. When may we expect the Latin ? I shall tell my classes 
to-morrow to get a copy of this if they can — if not, to look at the copy on 
the desk. 

In a subsequent note : 

In regard to the " Preparatory Greek Course," I find that a second and 
third reading only confirms my judgment, and adds to the wish that my 
early Greek teacher had possessed such an aid. 

I have watched with interest the students perusing the book at my desk. 
One of them asked if it would be a good book to present to a collegian 
brother. I trust he now possesses it. 

I told my students that, if they studied Greek, they would find it inval- 
uable, while if they could never read the Greek they would be very foolish 
not to seize such an opportunity to get the best part of the literature of the 
Preparatory Greek, and much beyond. 

JOSEPH CUMMINGS, D.D., President of the North-western University, 
(Evanston, 111.,) says : 

I highly recommend it, and hope the contemplated series will be 
completed. 

N. W. BENEDICT, D.D., Principal of the Rochester Free Academy, says : 

I find the work wrought with that skillful care and sound scholarship for 
which the author is distinguished. To effect the intended purpose I do 
not see how a book could have been better fitted. It leads with an entic- 
ing persuasion that could hardly be excelled. The selections from Greek 
authors, which make up so large a portion of the work, prove that the au- 
15 6 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



thor is at home in that vast mine of wealth, and is capable of distributing 
its resources wilh due discrimination. . . . Serviceable for those who could 
not select for themselves from the great mass of translations, but they 
ought not to be made to believe that they are taking a course of Greek or 
of Latin in English — that is a veritable impossibility. 

S. C. BARTLETT, D.D., President of Dartmouth College, says : 
It seems to me a valuable work, highly useful and instructive to a large 
class of thoughtful persons who cannot have access to the originals, and 
calculated to stimulate and expand the views of those who can. 

Noah Porter, D.D., LL.D., President of Yale College, says: 
I have examined with some care the volume by Professor W. C. Wilkin- 
son, entitled " Preparatory Greek Course in English," and I think it a val- 
uable addition to the abundant apparatus which is now furnished to the 
young student of the one language of which no aspirant for complete cult- 
ure can contentedly remain in ignorance. 

JAME3 B. ANGELL, LL.D., President of the University of Michigan, 
says: 

The difficulty of bringing one, who does not read the language in which' 
a literature is written, into close and appreciative and vital contact with 
the literature is very great, too great to be entirely overcome. But you 
have done more than I should have thought possible to overcome it. I 
have found myself thoroughly interested from the beginning to the end of 
your book. It seems to me that most readers must find themselves inter- 
ested in the same manner. And if they are interested they must be prof- 
ited. I trust you will go on with the series. 

ALVAH KOVEY, D.D., President of Newton Theological Institution, 
says: 

In these latter days I do not often read a volume through from begin- 
ning to end, without omitting a chapter, paragraph, or sentence. But I 
have read in this way your " Preparatory Greek Course," simply because 
it is so instructive and captivating a volume that I could not persuade my- 
self to pass over any word of it unread. 

KOWAED CE0S3Y, D.D., late Chancellor of the University of the City 
of New York, says : 

Professor Wilkinson has in this volume, with his usual skill and attract- 
iveness, begun a series of books to make readers who do not know Gr,eek 
acquainted with Greek literature. He has made a volume not only ad- 
mirably fitted for this purpose, but also exceedingly delightful to any one 
who may be of finished classical education. All Professor Wilkinson's 



Pkeparatory Greek: Course in English. 



writings are fresh, and cheery, as well as full of sound sense. There can 
be but one opinion of this Greek course so happily begun. 

M. B. ANDERSON, LL.D., President of the University of Rochester, 
says : 

It seems to me that your purpose is most excellent, and the skill with 
which you have accomplished it is all that could be desired. The work 
will be useful, not only to those for whom it was specially written, but also 
to young persons in a course of classical study in the academy or college. 
I am glad that you have conceived the idea of this course, and I have 
great confidence, judging from this volume as a specimen, that it will be 
carried with entire success to its completion. 

E. G. ROBINSON, D.D., LL.D., President of Brown University, (Provi- 
dence, R. I.,) says : 

Will undoubtedly do a good service, enabling intelligent readers who are 
unacquainted with Greek to attain some definite conception of the litera- 
ture of that language, as well as enlightening and quickening into intellect- 
ual life many a student who otherwise might know little or nothing, be- 
yond his mere lesson, of the book he was reading. The author, already so 
well known for his rhetorical skill, has more than equaled himself in this 
his latest book. 

The Hon. FRANCIS "WAYLAND, LL.D., Dean of the Law Department of 
Yale College, says : 

I have examined with great interest the ' ' Preparatory Greek Course in 
English," by Professor Wilkinson. 

The object aimed at seems to me most praiseworthy, and it is accom- 
plished in a manner in keeping with the design. I do not believe that it 
will diminish the number of those studying the original Greek, while it 
will certainly cultivate a knowledge and love of the spirit of the great Greek 
classics among those who, but for the aid of such a crutch, would never 
have walked over the "plains of windy Troy," or in " the olive grove of 
Academe." 

I shall be surprised if it does not reach a very wide circulation. 

F. B. PALMER, Ph.D., Principal of the State Normal School, Fredonia, 
N. Y., says : 

It seems to me admirably adapted to give young students a liking for 
old authors who will be ever young, and it adds a completeness of view 
which few young persons can get by a study of the ancient authors in the 
original, or even in the best ti-anslations. 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



Rev. J. H. VINCENT, D.D., Superintendent of Instruction, C. L. S. C, 
New Haven, says : 

I have just finished, for my own instruction, reading your "Preparatory 
Greek Course in English." My dear Doctor, that book is simply magnifi- 
cent. It is a complete success in every way, and I read it with the great- 
est enthusiasm. 

T. J. MORGAN, D.D., Principal of the State Normal School, Potsdam, 
N. Y., says : 

An admirable book, unique and happy in design, and well executed. I 
wish I might have had it while pursuing my classical studies in college. 

The Rev. S. L. CALDWELL, D.D., President of Vassar College, says : 
As the idea is capital, the execution is equally good. The selections 
from English translations seem to be well made, though their range could 
be broadened. The whole book shows ample knowledge and good taste, 
and is far enough from any dullness such as infects some books of this kind. 
Any intelligent person, and even one well-read in Greek, may read it to 
find it stimulating and instructive. I hope Professor Wilkinson may follow 
up an enterprise so well begun. 

Rev. GEORGE D. B. PEPPER, D.D., President of Colby University, 
(Waterville. Me.,) says : 

It is well fitted to stimulate to a thorough Greek scholarship, and 
equally fitted to serve an admirable purpose for those who can never study 
the Greek. I heartily hope that it will have a large sale and a great fu- 
ture. It will always be a pleasure for me to commend it. 

S. A. ELLIS, A.M., Superintendent of Public Instruction, Rochester, 
N. Y., says : 

A somewhat critical examination of the entire work fully confirms the 
favorable impression I formed at the first reading. . . . The book will be 
found to be both scholarly and popular — two qualities often divorced from 
each other. ... I am confident that whoever begins " The Preparatory 
Greek Course in English" will read it through to the end, and will look 
with eager expectancy, as I shall, for the other volumes that are to follow. 

Subsequently : 

In our estimation it grows better and better. 

W. S. PERRY, Superintendent of City Schools in Ann Arbor, says : 
To parents who are attempting to follow their children in their studies 
through a course of Greek — as parents ought to do in all studies, when 

9 



Preparatory Gr^.ek Course in English. 



possible — the kind and mass of information in this volume will be of ines- 
timable value ; and to Greek students the classic road, so often, at first, 
narrow, dark, and irksome, will be made broad, bright, and even alluring. 

I heartily commend the book, believing that it deserves to be widely- 
circulated. 

Professor W. F. ALLEN, Professor of Latin in the University of Wis- 
consin, says : 

ft seems to me that it is better adapted to give non-classical readers a 
notion of what classical literature is than any other book with which I am 
acquainted. I shall look with interest for the succeeding volumes. . . . 
The author errs, perhaps, in the amount of his explanatory remarks, which 
are often very diffuse ; but I cannot tell how this would strike a person 
who was unacquainted with Greek. 

W. W. BEMAN, Professor in the University of Michigan, says : 

The plan of the author, though novel, seems to me not only not imprac- 
ticable, but most feasible and attractive. 

To those who have almost forgotten the Greek they once studied but 
would enjoy reviving their recollections without great expenditure of time, 
or to those who do not care to master the intricacies of this subject, yet 
would like to know something of a language which has interested so many 
thousands so deeply, I can most heartily commend the work. 

Rev. A. P. PEABODY, D.D., LL.D., late of Harvard University, says : 
1 have looked through Mr. Wilkinson's " Preparatory Greek Course in 
English," and am prepared to give it my warmest commendation. It sup- 
plies a need which is more and more felt from year to year, for two reasons, 
one for which I rejoice, the higher standard of culture that prevails in so- 
ciety at large ; the other, inevitable, yet to me a subject of regret, the di- 
minishing disposition on the part of well-educated people to study the 
classical languages. 

C. K. ADAMS, LL.D., Professor of History in the University of Michigan, 
says : 

I found almost nothing to criticise. I cannot conscientiously say less 
than that you have written an excellent book on a difficult subject. I could 
not commend your book, if I thought it would be deemed a substitute for 
studies in the Greek language. But it seems to me well calculated to 
sharpen the appetite instead of satisfying it. At some points I should prob- 
ably have made other selections than those you have given. For example, 
the witty sayings of the Greeks now come rather insipid. But your ac- 
counts of the larger works are admirable. In short, the book as a whole 

10 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 

is remarkably well adapted to tempt the reader to a further acquaintance 
with Greek literature and life. And this is saying much ; for, in these 
busy and distracting times, education is apt to drift away from the safe an- 
chorage of the classics, and whatever tends to hold it to its moorings 
performs a service for which all scholars should be grateful. 
WILLIAM C. CONANT, in " Vidi Correspondence," says : 
The scholarly reader will find his attention rewarded by observations 
original and striking enough, and by reviews of the Greek and Latin lan- 
guages, literature, and affairs eloquent enough, to justify the promise of 
much more than a popular compend. The main purpose, however, is to 
impart to the uncolleged intellect as much as possible of convenient clas- 
sical information, and of the rich classic tone with which Professor Wilkin- 
son's own style and substance are so delightfully penetrated, while so free, 
so humorous, shrewd, and American. 

JOSEPH COOK says< 

Professor W. C. Wilkinson's "Preparatory Greek Course in English" 
breathes the true Hellenic spirit. No one can master it without coming 
into inspiring communion with the greatest of the classic ages. 

The " Nation " says : 

Of all the devices for introducing non-classical readers to a knowledge 
of the ancient classics, we are inclined to think that Mr. Wilkinson's (or 
Dr. Vincent's, for to him the compiler gives the credit of the idea) is the 
most effective. It is to proceed on the course the classical student himself 
follows : to make the reader acquainted first with the land, then with the 
people, then (but this is, perhaps, a mistake) to give a peep at the lan- 
guage, and follow it up with a few fables, a dialogue of Lucian, and enough 
of Xenophon and Homer to make him tolerably familiar with them. After 
an introduction like this — and it really gives one a higher respect for our 
preparatory course to see how effective it is — the reader will be able to take 
hold of Sophocles, Plato, and Demosthenes with a much better under- 
standing. The author has his faults : he talks too much — not in the way 
of explanation, but in his introductions, etc. . . . Another defect — and we 
wonder it did not deter him from the work altogether — is his want of sym- 
pathy with the subject. . . . On the whole, however, he has succeeded in 
this [in conveying to his readers the genuine spirit of antiquity] better than 
might be expected, and the occasional notes and remarks are for the most 
part very good and appropriate, and especially to be commended for 
vivacity. . . . 

. . . We think we may safely predict that the four volumes will present a 
unique and very satisfactory view of ancient literature for non-classical read- 

11 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



ers. We hope that the translations will be taken from a very wide range, 
so as to include, for example, such choice bits as Matthew Arnold's trans- 
lations from Sophocles and Theocritus in his " Essays in Criticism." 

The " Independent " says : 

Whatever doubts one may have on the start as to the gain for sound 
learning in the numerous attempts to popularize it in manuals or in summer 
schools, "Where the Attic bird trills her thick-warbled notes the summer 
long," he must lay them aside, as we do, on examining William Cleaver 
Wilkinson's " Preparatory Greek Course in English," (New York : Phillips 
& Hunt.) It aims at the very end which seems of such questionable utility 
to many of us, to give a kind of Greek education in English to persons 
who cannot get it in Greek. We have examined the book with unusual 
care, and with our doubts hovering near as to the question whether this 
were not another attempt to acquire the French language in English, or to 
achieve something else without achieving it. But our doubts are laid. 
There is a large class of people who will find this book exceedingly useful, 
and we hardly venture to say just how large we think the class is who need 
not be ashamed to make use of it. Whoever takes it up will have to give 
his mind to it, and work as hard in English as a Greek. Professor Wil- 
kinson marks out a course for him which tolerates no " scamping" of work. 
He first introduces him to a general review of what is implied in a Greek 
education ; then sketches the country and traces roughly its history. He 
then introduces him, by graded steps, to the literature, leading him on by 
select translations, which are brought before him in the skillfully prepared 
text, from Xenophon to Homer. In a supplement the author arranges for 
his pupils a kind of written examination scheme, which he proceeds to 
conduct him through. The manual contains well-timed suggestions as to 
books, and how to use them. Three classes of students may make good 
use of it — those who really cannot do more and who are anxious to do the 
most they can. They will find just what they require in this judicious in- 
troduction to Greek literature and history. We commend it, also, to those 
whose curiosity is not too great to be satisfied with a sketch, and to those 
who have no other means at their command of following their children at 
school, of aiding them, and of enjoying with them the studies whose bene- 
fit they did not have in early life. 

The " "Westminster Review " says : 

The aim of this book, and it is a very praiseworthy one, is, etc. . . . On 
the whole, we believe that the conscientious study of this book by unedu- 
cated readers would make for cultivation and refinement. But we depre- 
cate the patronizing style in which the author, from the heights of his own 

12 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



splendid erudition, addresses the "untutored minds" of his own savage 
countrymen. 

The " Literary World" (Boston) says : 

A bright and useful book. The author has no respect for classical tra- 
dition ; but his iconoclasm only gives an added zest to his piquant criti- 
cisms. . . . The author acts as a personal instructor, and takes the pupil 
into his confidence, who thus gains much of the inspiration which is usu- 
ally to be had only from the living teacher. . . . The accounts of great 
writers are excellent, and the selections from their works are admirably 
chosen, the chapter comparing the various translations of Homer being 
particularly suggestive. 

The " Latine " says : 

One of the most valuable books for promoting the study of Greek that 
have yet been issued in this country. ... Of value not only to the be- 
ginner in Greek, but also to the parent who wishes to aid his boy or girl, 
and to the teacher who would help without weakening the student. It has 
gained remarkable popularity, (eighteenth thousand.) It gives us pleasure 
to announce the early appearance of the " Latin Course." We bespeak for 
it yet wider circulation than the " Greek Course " has reached. It will fill 
a great gap in the student's library ; will be (judging by the " Greek 
Course") a book to make a boy " love " his Latin. 

The " Christian TJnion " (New York) says : 

It is the lament of many mothers and sisters that as soon as the boys of 
the household enter upon classical studies they pass into a world whose 
doors are shut to them. . . . The separation between members of the same 
family, even between husband and wife, frequently begins with a pursuit 
in which one is a solitary student. Now these books, a series of four, in 
which this is the first, aim to remove this difficulty, and allow those who 
cannot study the Greek and Latin languages to keep pace with the stu- 
dent by following an English equivalent. . . . The results of a faithful use 
of these volumes will be more than simple mental acquisitions ; they take 
hold upon the mightiest influences of this world, the participation of the 
home circle in the advanced work of its young students. We cordially 
commend this course of study to all the homes in the land where the refin- 
ing influences of life are sought. Parents who have long since forgotten the 
pursuits of college will enjoy the refreshment which these books will afford. 

The " Canadian Baptist " says : 

We believe that almost all of our readers, including ministers, teachers, 
Sunday-school workers, and students, would be greatly profited by reading 

13 



Preparatory Greek Course in English, 



this book, which is not only admirable in its idea, but is prepared with con- 
summate ability. It is a book, we assure you, that you will thoroughly 
enjoy, and that you will advise all your neighbors to read. Many parts of 
it you will desire to read more than once. 

The " National Baptist " says : 

The idea strikes us favorably, and Professor Wilkinson has admirably 
and with enthusiasm made the idea a realization. Not only has he caught 
the spirit of the Greek masterpieces, but he has so imbued his book with 
it, giving throughout the best thoughts and passages, that the reader glows 
with desire to know and learn more. 

The " American Rural Home " (Rochester, N. Y.) says : 
For the work here undertaken no man could be found more fitly equipped 
than Dr. Wilkinson. By native tastes, by special culture, by long educa- 
tional experience, he is richly endowed ; and a careful examination of this 
well-printed volume shows that he has been prodigal of his resources. In 
apt language and attractive manner, with frequent vivacity and ever keen 
insight, he tells us, in the first fifty-eight pages, the sum and substance known 
about early Grecian literature and philosophy ; and follows his admirable 
condensation with two hundred pages of review, abstract, and variously 
translated quotation, admitting one ignorant of even the Greek alphabet 
into close acquaintance with Xenophon's Anabasis and the Iliad and Odys- 
sey of Homer. And so clear, so fresh, so learned, and yet so simple is his 
presentation, so discursive often and so happy altogether, that one reads it 
as if it were romance, until, reading it thoroughly, one may know nearly 
as much of the three Greek works most familiar as the college graduate 
knows. It is such a book as it seems somebody should have given us long 
ago, and yet just such a book as no one, we suspect, but Dr. Wilkinson 
eould have made. 

In the " Home Mission Monthly," Rev. H. L. MOREHOUSE, D.D., says : 

There is nothing dry nor prosy in the volume. Translations of the pas- 
sages usually studied in the preparatory Greek course are interwoven with 
vivacious comments and descriptions of persons, places, and events. So 
that by the perusal of the work the reader may obtain a better knowledge 
of Grecian life, character, customs laws, and literature than in any other 
volume known to us. 

We are strongly inclined to the opinion that in many of the schools of 
the Home Mission Society for the colored people, the work could be prof- 
itably used as a' text-book for those who have neither time nor the training 
to master the original Greek. If one quarter the time spent in the study 
of the Greek course covered by this volume were to be devoted to a mas- 
15* u 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



teiy of the contents of this book, the information obtained would be im- 
measurably greater, and the intellectual discipline perhaps not less 
valuable. 

The " Standard " (Chicago) says : 

The plan of the volume is carried out in a complete and workmanlike 
manner, as all who know Dr. Wilkinson would expect. . . . Dr. Wilkin- 
son, so far as this first volume of his series is concerned, fully realizes his 
idea, which is certainly an admirable one. . . . Cannot fail, we think, of a 
brilliant success. 

The u Baptist Quarterly Review " says : 

The author is correct in supposing that there are many, some in unsus- 
pected quarters, who will gladly welcome such a volume. 

The author is well known as a critic and scholar of high attainments, 
and as a clear, vigorous, and popular writer. . . . What the author's pre- 
vious literary efforts would lead us to expect, a work of superior merit in 
every respect. The common people will read it gladly, while many a col- 
lege graduate may, by its perusal, add so much to his knowledge of Xeno- 
phon, Homer, etc., as to suggest that he is enjoying the pleasure of form- 
ing new acquaintances among interesting people. 

The "Examiner" (New York) says: 

Those who know Dr. Wilkinson, either personally or from his writings, 
know that he never does any thing by halves. We believe that he is in- 
capable of doing a slovenly piece of work. If he should undertake to pre- 
pare an elementary spelling-book he would aim to make the best possible 
spelling-book. It is not often that a man of Dr. Wilkinson's literary abil- 
ity gives himself to the work of enlightening the masses. If such men 
allow their names to appear on the title-pages of popular books, the bulk 
of the work is generally performed by men of inferior ability. But here we 
have a popular book prepared by a writer of first-rate ability, and we are 
assured that he has given to the making of it his best thought and skill. 
. . . Then in ten paragraphs he tells almost all one cares to know about 
the physical features of the country. The same high praise is due to the 
section on " The People." The section on " Their Writings" we should 
be' glad to copy entire had we the space to spare. . . . The author con- 
ducts us through the Anabasis in a most satisfactoiy way. He first gives a 
full account of the book, and then selecting the most striking passages from 
each book, in an English translation, connects them by a briefer narrative 
of his own, interspersed with brilliant and learned (never obtrusively 
learned) remarks. The same course is pursued with the Iliad and the 

Odyssey, the selections being taken from the best metrical versions of these 

15 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



poems. The introductory remarks on Homer are particularly good. Take 
a few sentences : . . . We trust that no one of our readers will do himself 
the injustice of failing to read this book. 

The " Watchman " (Boston) says : 

The plan is an ingenious one, and is carried out with spirit. It need not 
be said that the fine literary taste and critical acumen of Professor Wilkin- 
son are shown to much advantage. Only by a fair trial can the practical 
worth of such a series be proved. We have found pleasure in reading this 
volume. 

The " Methodist Quarterly Review " says : 

The writer gives frank credit to Dr. Vincent for the origination of the 
idea of this volume, as well as ample suggestions in its production ; and 
the compliment might be reciprocated that he has filled out, and more than 
filled out, the programme with eminent ability and success. ... It fur- 
nishes to the young student a clear idea of what he is going about. . . . 
In the olden time his Latin grammar was put into his hands, then his man- 
ual of selections with dictionary, then his Virgil, and he plodded like a 
miner cutting a tunnel through a rock. A book like this would have thrown 
an illumination around his path, revealing to him where he was, and what 
the surroundings of the route he was obliged to pursue. Mr. Wilkinson 
has done his work in the best manner, varying his style through a variety 
of changes, now cheerily colloquial, now running an even level, and anon 
rising with graceful ease into a strain of lofty eloquence. 

The " Canadian Methodist Magazine " says : 

Designed to give the English reader some such knowledge of classic 
literature as the college graduate obtains through the original text. We 
venture to say that in many cases it will be a superior knowledge. 

The " Morning Journal and Courier " (New Haven) says : 
A book well calculated to be useful. If the other three books are as 
good as the first one the series ought to be a great success. 

The " Journal of Education " (Boston) says : 

The aim and purpose of this valuable book cannot be too strongly com- 
mended. 

The " Teacher " (Philadelphia) says : 
Worthy of the attention of all intelligent readers. 
The " Teacher's Guide " (Cleveland) says : 

Will be gratefully welcomed by cultivated people in whose scheme of 
education Latin and Greek were unfortunately omitted. . . . Supplying 



Preparatory Greek Course in English. 



also a great deal of general information relative to the subject, otherwise 
imparted by the teacher in response to questions from his class. 

The " Louisiana Journal of Education " says : 

High schools and academies in which Greek is taught should be fur- 
nished with a copy of this admirable work for the benefit of their pupils 
and classes. The analysis of Homer's Iliad, illustrated by quotations 
from the best translators, may be read with interest, even by scholars suf- 
ficiently advanced to comprehend and enjoy the original. 

The " Visitor and Teacher " (Kirksville, Mo.) says : 

We have read many of our best novels and found none more thoroughly 
enjoyable, from first to last, than this work, and would unhesitatingly rec- 
ommend it to all lovers of good literature. 

HASTINGS H. HAKT, President of the C. L. S. C, (Worthington, Minn.,) 
says : 

Our circle is now reading and discussing the book with great delight. 
One mother has been led by it into the study of Latin, in order to keep 
pace with her son. 

Mrs. E. Z. SOTTTHWICK, member of the Chautauqua Literary and Scien- 
tific Circle, (Angola, Erie Co., N. Y.,) says : 

I consider Dr. Wilkinson a most delightful author, and heartily respond 
to his " Auf wiedersehen? and am one of those who " have a mind to lin- 
ger a little, still holding their friend by the hand, as they pass out at their 
leisure through the halls and corridors beyond." Believe me, dear sir, a 
most grateful beneficiary of the C. L. S. C. 

W 



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